- 


MEMORIAL   ADDRESSES 


ON   THE 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER 


OF 


THADDEUS    STEVENS, 


DELIVERED    IN   THE 


HOUSE   OF   REPRESENTATIVES, 


WASHINGTON,  1).  C.,  DKCIttlliKll  17,  JSO.s, 


L I  B  R  A  R  Y 

UNIVERSITY  OF 

CALIFORNIA. 


WASHINGTON: 

G  O  V  E  R  N  M  E  N  T     PRINTING     O  F  F  I  C  E 

1869. 


ADDRESSES. 

Remarks  by  Mr.  Dickey. 

Mr.  SPEAKER  :  The  painful  duty  has  devolved  upon  me  of 
announcing  to  this  House  the  death  of  my  predecessor,  Hon. 
THADDEUS  STEVENS,  of  Pennsylvania. 

This  distinguished  statesman  was  not  merely  my  predeces 
sor  in  this  body,  but  in  my  childhood  my  father  taught  me  to 
admire  and  love  him,  who  was  the  instructor  and  guide  of  my 
youth  and  the  friend  of  my  mature  years.  If  an  intimacy 
with  wise  and  noble  men  be  one  of  the  greatest  blessings  that 
can  crown  a  man,  then  in  no  part  of  my  career  have  I  been  so 
fortunate  as  in  my  association  with  Thaddeus  Stevens.  'It 
was  in  his  office,  and  in  connection  with  him,  that  I  com 
menced  my  professional  life;  and  from  that  moment,  through 
the  turmoil  of  many  legal  and  political  contests,  down  to  the 
moment  when  in  his  last  will  he  selected  me  to  perform  the 
last  service  one  man  can  ask  from  his  fellow,  our  friendship 
suffered  neither  diminution  nor  interruption. 

Informed  that  my  duty  requires  of  me  a  sketch  of  the  his 
tory  of  my  friend,  I  hope  to  be  pardoned  by  the  House  for  any 
prolixity  of  statement,  promising  to  leave  to  others  abler  and 
fitter,  his  associates  here  who  are  to  follow  me,  the  analysis 
of  his  character  as  a  statesman  and  the  story  of  his  struggles 
and  triumphs  in  this  arena,  where  he  was  recognized  as  a 
great  leader  and  bore  the  name  of  "The  Old  Commoner." 

Thaddeus  Stevens  was  born  at  Danville,  Caledonia  county, 
Vermont,  on  the  4th  day  of  April,  1792,  and  died  at  his 
residence  in  this  city  at  midnight  on  the  llth  day  of  Au 
gust,  1868.  His  parents  were  poor,  in  a  community  where 
poverty  was  the  rule  and  wealth  the  exception.  Of  his  father 


2  REMARKS    OF    MR.    DICKEY    ON    THE 

I  know  but  little,  save  that  he  enlisted  in  the  war  of  1812, 
and  died  in  service.  Upon  his  mother  chiefly  fell  the  burden 
of  rearing  their  four  sons.  She  was  a  woman  of  great  energy, 
strong  will,  and  deep  piety.  Early  seeing  the  ambition  and 
fully  sympathizing  with  the  aspirations  of  her  crippled  boy, 
she  devotedly  seconded  his  efforts  for  the  acquisition  of 
knowledge,  and  by  her  industry,  energy,  and  frugality  largely 
aided  him  in  procuring  a  collegiate  education.  He  returned 
her  affection  with  the  full  strength  of  his  strong  nature,  and 
for  many  years  after  he  had  acquired  fame  and  fortune  in  his 
adopted  State  had  the  pleasure  of  making  an  annual  pilgrim 
age  to  the  home  which  he  had  provided  for  her  comfort,  and 
where  she  dispensed,  with  means  he  furnished,  a  liberal 
charity. 

In  the  last  year  of  his  life,  in  writing  his  will  with  his  own 
hand,  while  making  no  provision  for  the  care  of  his  own 
grave,  he  did  not  forget  that  of  his  mother,  but  set  apart  an 
ample  sum  for  that  purpose,  directing  yearly  payments  upon 
the  condition  "that  the  sexton  keep  the  grave  in  good  order, 
and  plant  roses  and  other  cheerful  flowers  at  each  of  the  four 
corners  of  said  grave  every  spring."  In  the  same  instrument, 
in  devising  $1?000  in  aid  of  the  establishment  at  his  home  of 
a  Baptist  church,  of  which  society  his  mother  was  an  earnest 
member,  he  says: 

I  do  this  out  of  respect  to  the  memory  of  my  mother,  to  whom  I  owe  what 
ever  little  prosperity  I  have  had  on  earth,  which,  small  as  it  is,  I  desire  em 
phatically  to  acknowledge. 

After  attending  the  common  schools  of  the  neighborhood 
he  fitted  for  college  at  the  Peacham  Academy,  in  his  native 
county,  entered  the  University  of  Vermont,  and  remained 
there  about  two  years.  The  college  suspending  operations 
on  account  of  the  war,  he  proceeded  to  Dartmouth,  and 
graduated  at  that  institution  in  1814.  After  reading  law  at 
Peacham,  in  the  office  of  Judge  Mattocks,  for  some  months, 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.  3 

he  left  his  native  State  and  settled  in  Pennsylvania  in  1815,  \ 
first  in  the  town  of  York,  where  he  taught  an  academy  and 
pursued  his  legal  studies.  The  rules  of  court  in  that  dis.->- 
trict  having  required  students  to  read  one  year  in  the  office 
of  an  attorney,  he  went  to  Belair,  Harford  county,  Maryland, 
and  was  there  examined  and  admitted  to  practice  in  August, 
1816.  He  at  once  returned  to  Pennsylvania  and  opened  a  law 
office  at  Gettysburg,  in  the  county  of  Adams,  and  entered 
upon  the  practice  of  his  profession  in  that  and  adjoining 
counties.  He  was  soon  in  the  possession  of  an  extensive  and 
lucrative  business,  to  which  he  gave  his  entire  attention  for 
some  sixteen  years.  I  may  here  be  allowed  briefly  to  allude  to 
a  few  traits  of  Mr.  Stevens  as  a  lawyer.  Although  not  perhaps 
of  great  national  reputation  as  such,  he  was  recognized  by  the 
profession  in  a  State  claiming  some  eminence  for  the  high 
character  of  her  advocates  and  jurists  as  one  of  her  greatest 
lawyers,  and  was  so  pronounced  by  three  of  her  ablest  chief 
justices,  Gibson,  Black,  and  Lewis,  who  tried  him  by  the  sure 
test  of  uniform  power. 

I  need  scarcely  say  that  Mr.  Stevens  shone  at  the  bar  with 
the  same  clearness  of  statement,  force,  and  eloquence  of  ex 
pression,  power  of  argumentation,  wit,  sarcasm,  and  invec 
tive,  which  he  employed  in  legislative  halls,  and  that  there, 
as  here,  he  was  master  of  all  the  weapons  of  debate.  As  an 
advocate  he  was  always  jealous  of  the  rights  of  his  profes 
sion,  and  resisted  their  innovation.  He  was  always  courteous 
to  the  court,  and  uniformly  brief,  never  speaking  beyond  an 
hour  upon  any  question.  He  never  took  or  used  notes  of  the 
evidence,  the  speeches  of  opponents,  or  the  rulings  of  the 
court,  trusting  wholly  to  a  memory  that  never  failed  him.  In 
the  preparation  of  his  law  he  was  industrious  and  careful; 
here,  too,  relying  upon  his  memory,  his  brief  seldom  con 
tained  more  than  the  name  of  the  case  and  page  of  the  book. 


REMARKS    OF    MR.    DICKEY    ON    THE 


In  argument  lie  cited  but  few  authorities,  and  those  directly 
to  his  purpose.  Grasping  one  or  two  points  which  he  con 
ceived  vital  to  the  cause,  he  directed  all  his  energies  and 
concentrated  all  his  powers  upon  them,  giving  little  attention 
to  subordinate  questions.  No  matter  with  whom  associated, 
he  never  tried  a  cause  save  upon  his  own  theory  of  the  case. 
At  nisi  prius  he  uniformly  insisted  on  personally  seeing 
and  examining,  before  they  were  called,  the  important  wit 
nesses  on  his  own  side.  Generally  relying  upon  the  strength 
and  presentation  of  his  OAVII  case,  he  seldom  indulged  in 
extended  cross-examination  of  witnesses,  though  possess 
ing  rare  ability  in  that  direction.  He  never  consented  to  be 
concerned  or  to  act  as  counsel  in  the  prosecution  of  a  capital 
case,  not  from  opposition  to  the  punishment,  but  because  it 
was  repugnant  to  his  feelings  and  that  service  was  the  duty 
of  public  officers.  He  was  as  remarkable  for  his  consideration, 
forbearance,  and  kindness  when  opposed  by  the  young,  weak, 
or  diffident,  as  he  was  for  the  grim  jest,  haughty  sneer, 
pointed  sarcasm,  or  fierce  invective  launched  at  one  who 
entered  the  lists  and  challenged  battle  with  such  weapons. 
He  was  always  willing  to  give  advice  and  assistance  to  the 
young  and  inexperienced  members  of  the  profession,  and  his 
large  library  was  ever  open  for  their  use.  He  had  many 
young  men  read  law  with  him,  though  he  did  not  care  to 
have  students.  There  were,  however,  two  recommendations 
which  never  failed  to  procure  an  entrance  into  his  office :  am 
bition  to  learn,  and  inability  to  pay  for  the  privilege. 

Mr.  Stevens  first  engaged  actively  in  politics  with  the  rise 
of  the  anti-Masonic  party  in  1828-'29,  which  he  joined  in  their 
opposition  to  secret  societies.  He  was  elected  to  the  popular 
branch  of  the  legislature  of  his  State,  in  1833,  as  a  represent 
ative  from  the  county  of  Adams,  and  continued  to  serve  in 
that  body  almost  without  interruption  until  1840,  during 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.  5 

which  entire  period  he  was  the  leader  of  his  party  in  the 
legislature,  if  not  the  State.  During  this  service  he  cham 
pioned  many  measures  of  improvement,  among  others  the 
common-school  system  of  Pennsylvania,  which  at  a  critical 
moment  he  saved  from  overthrow  by  a  speech  which  he  always 
asserted  to  have  been,  in  his  opinion,  the  most  effective  he 
ever  made.  By  that  single  effort  he  established  the  principle, 
never  since  seriously  questioned  in  Pennsylvania,  that  it  is  the 
duty  of  the  State  to  provide  the  facilities  for  education  to  all 
the  children  of  the  Commonwealth.  In  behalf  of  this  measure 
he  joined  hands  with  his  bitterest  personal  and  political  ene 
mies.  He  highly  eulogized  for  his  course  upon  this  question 
the  chief  of  the  opposing  political  party,  Governor  George 
Wolf,  and  denounced  with  all  his  power  of  invective  the  time- 
servers  of  his  own  party.  Himself  the  child  of  poverty  he 
plead  the  cause  of  the  poor,  and  by  the  force  of  his  will,  intel 
lect,  and  eloquence,  broke  down  the  barriers  enacted  by 
wealth,  caste,  and  ignorance,  and  earned  a  name  that  will 
endure  as  long  as  a  child  of  Pennsylvania  gratefully  remem 
bers  the  blessings  conferred  by  light  and  knowledge. 

In  1837-'38,  Mr.  Stevens  was  a  member  of  the  convention 
called  to  revise  the  constitution  of  Pennsylvania,  an  assem 
blage  which  numbered  as  members  many  of  the  strongest  men 
of  the  State,  among  whom  Mr.  Stevens  stood  in  the  front 
rank.  This  convention,  notwithstanding  the  able  and  stren 
uous  opposition  of  a  strong  minority,  led  by  Mr.  Stevens, 
inserted  the  word  " white"  as  a  qualification  of  suffrage,  thus 
disfranchising  a  race.  On  this  account  he  refused  to  append 
his  name  to  the  completed  instrument,  and  stood  alone  in  such 
refusal.  For  the  same  cause  he  opposed,  but  unsuccessfully, 
the  ratification  by  the  people. 

In  1842  Mr.  Stevens,  finding  himself  deeply  in  debt  by  rea 
son  of  losses  in  the  iron  business,  and  liabilities  incurred  for 


6  EEMARKS    OF    MR.    DICKEY    ON    THE 

numerous  endorsernents.made  for  friends,  removed  to  Lancas 
ter  county,  one  of  the  largest,  richest,  and  most  populous 
counties  of  the  State,  and  resumed  the  practice  of  his  profes 
sion.  His  reputation  as  a  lawyer  had  preceded  him,  and  his 
income  almost  at  once  became  the  largest  at  the  bar.  In  a  few 
years  he  paid  his  debts,  and  saved  the  bulk  of  his  estate.  In 
1848  and  1850  he  was  elected  to  Congress  from  Lancaster 
county,  when,  declining  to  be  a  candidate,  he  returned  to  his 
profession  until  1858,  when  he  was  again  elected,  and  con 
tinued  to  hold  the  seat  without  interruption  till  his  death. 
His  course  upon  this  floor  has  passed  into  and  forms  no 
unimportant  part  in  the  history  of  a  mighty  people  in  a 
great  crisis  of  their  existence.  But  I  have  promised  to  leave 
to  others  to  say  what  may  be  proper  in  illustration  of  his 
great  achievements  in  his  latter  days. 

To  those  here  who  judged  of  the  personal  appearance  of  the 
deceased  only  as  they  looked  on  him  bearing  the  burden  ol 
years  and  stricken  with  disease,  though  he  still  stood  with  eye 
undimmed  and  will  undaunted,  I  may  say  that  in  his  prime 
he  was  a  man  physically  well  proportioned,  muscular  and 
strong,  of  clear  and  ruddy  complexion,  with  face  and  feature 
of  great  mobility  and  under  perfect  command  and  control.  In 
his  youth  and  early  manhood,  notwithstanding  his  lameness, 
he  entered  with  zest  into  almost  all  of  the  athletic  games  and 
sports  of  the  times.  He  was  an  expert  swimmer  and  an 
excellent  horseman.  When  residing  at  Gettysburg  he  fol 
lowed  the  chase,  and  kept  his  hunters  and  hounds. 

On  a  recent  visit  to  his  iron-works  I  found  the  old  moun 
tain  men  garrulous  with  stories  of  the  risks  and  dangers  of 
the  bold  rider,  as  with  horse  and  hound  he  followed  the  deer 
along  the  slopes  and  through  the  gaps  of  the  South  mountain. 

In  private  life,  among  his  friends,  Mr.  Stevens  was  ever 
genial,  kind,  and  considerate.  To  them  he  was  linked  with 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS. 


hooks  of  steel.  For  them  he  would  labor  and  sacrifice  without 
stint,  complaint,  or  regret.  In  his  hours  of  relaxation  there 
could  be  no  more  genial  companion.  His  rare  conversational 
powers,  fund  of  anecdote,  brilliant  sallies  of  wit,  and  wise  say 
ings  upon  the  topic  of  the  hour,  made  his  company  much 
sought,  and  many  of  these  are  the  current  coin  of  the  circle 
in  which  he  moved. 

Mr.  Stevens  was  an  honest  and  truthful  man  in  public  and 
in  private  life.  His  word  was  sacred  in  letter  and  spirit,  and 
was  never  paltered  in  a  double  sense.  In  money  matters  he 
was  liberal  to  a  fault,  and  out  of  his  immense  professional 
income  he  left  but  a  meager  estate.  In  his  private  charity  he 
was  lavish.  He  was  incapable  of  saying  no  in  the  presence  of 
want  or  misery.  His  charity,  like  his  political  convictions, 
regarded  neither  creed,  race,  nor  color.  He  was  a  good  clas 
sical  scholar,  and  was  well  read  in  ancient  and  modern  litera 
ture,  especially  on  subjects  of  philosophy  and  laAV.  In  his  old 
age  he  read  but  few  books.  Shakspeare,  Dante,  Homer,  Mil 
ton,  and  the  Bible  could,  however,  generally  be  found  upon 
the  table  in  his  sleeping  room,  where  he  was  accustomed  to 
read  in  bed.  He  was  simple  and  temperate  in  his  habits. 
He  disliked  the  use  of  tobacco,  and  for  forty  years  never 
used  or  admitted  to  his  house  intoxicating  drinks  except  by 
direction  of  his  physician. 

Mr.  Stevens  was  deeply  loved  and  fully  trusted  by  his  con 
stituents.  He  was  often  in  advance  of  their  views ;  sometimes 
he  ran  counter  to  their  prejudices  or  passions ;  yet  such  was 
his  popularity  with  them,  so  strong  their  faith  in  his  wisdom, 
in  the  integrity  of  his  action  and  the  purity  of  his  purpose  that 
they  never  failed  to  sustain  him.  Popular  with  men  of  all 
parties,  with  his  own  supporters  his  name  was  a  household 
word.  To  them,  and  among  themselves,  "Old  Thad"  was  a 
phrase  of  endearment ;  while  even  his  foes  spoke  of  him  with 


8  REMARKS    OF    MR.    DICKEY    ON    THE 


pride  as  the  "  Great  Commoner.'7  No  man  ever  died  more 
deeply  mourned  by  a  constituency  than  Thaddeus  Stevens. 

Having  briefly  selected  some  of  the  incidents  that  marked 
the  history  of  my  friend,  I  will  in  conclusion  say  a  few  words 
of  him  on  a  subject  in  connection  with  which  he  is  probably 
more  widely  known  than  any  other — slavery.  Mr.  Stevens  was 
always  an  anti-slavery  man.  From  the  time  he  left  his  native 
mountains  to  the  moment  of  his  death  he  was  not  only  anti- 
slavery  in  the  common  acceptation  of  the  term,  but  a  bold, 
fearless,  determined  and  uncompromising1  foe  to  oppression  in 
any  and  every  form.  He  was  an  abolitionist  before  there  was 
such  a  party  name. 

His  opposition  to  American  slavery,  no  matter  what  his 
party  connection,  was  never  based  upon  mere  questions  of 
political  economy.  He  always  viewed  it  as  a  great  wrong,  at 
war  with  the  fundamental  principles  of  this  and  all  good  gov 
ernment,  as  a  sin  in  the  sight  of  God  and  a  crime  against  man. 
For  many  years,  long  before  it  became  popular  to  do  so,  he 
denounced  this  institution  as  the  great  crime  of  the  nation,  on 
the  stump,  at  the  forum,  in  party  conventions  and  deliberative 
assemblies.  On  this  question  he  was  always  in  advance  of  his 
party,  his  State,  and  his  constituents.  Always  resident  in  a 
border  county,  he  defended  the  fugitive  on  all  occasions, 
asserted  the  right  of  free  speech,  and  stood  between  the  aboli 
tionist  and  the  mob,  often  with  peril  to  himself.  This  was  one 
great  cause  of  his  having  been  so  long  in  a  minority,  and  of 
his  entrance  late  in  life  into  the  councils  of  the  nation ;  but  for 
this  he  was  fully  compensated  by  living  to  see  the  destruction 
of  an  institution  which  he  loathed,  and  by  receiving  for  his 
reward,  and  as  the  crowning  glory  of  his  life,  the  blessings  of 
millions  he  had  so  largely  aided  to  make  free. 

The  remains  of  Mr.  Stevens  lie  in  Lancaster,  in  a  private 
cemetery  established  by  an  old  friend,  in  a  lot  selected  by  him- 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.  9 

self,  for  reasons  stated  in  the  touching  and  beautiful  epitaph 
prepared  by  himself  for  inscription  upon  his  tomb : 

I  repose  in  this  quiet  and  secluded  spot,  not  from  any  natural  preference 
for  solitude,  but  finding  other  cemeteries  limited  by  charter  rules  as  to  race,  I 
have  chosen  it  that  I  might  be  enabled  to  illustrate  in  my  death  the  principles 
which  I  have  advocated  th'ough  a  long  life — equality  of  man  before  his  Creator. 

Let  us  trust  and  believe  that  if  the  earnest  and  sincere 
prayers  of  millions  of  the  poor,  downtrodden,  and  oppressed 
may  smooth  the  pathway  of  the  traveller  on  his  journey  from 
this  world  to  the  bourne  of  all,  his  has  been  a  happy  exit. 

I  offer  the  following  resolutions: 

Resolved,  That  this  House  has  heard  with  deep  regret  the  death  of  Hon.  Thad- 
deus  Stevens,  a  member  of  this  House  from  the  State  of  Pennsylvania. 

Resolved,  That  as  a  testimony  of  respect  to  the  memory  of  this  distinguished 
statesman  the  officers  and  members  of  this  House  will  wear  the  usual  badge  of 
mourning  for  the  space  of  thirty  days. 

Resolved,  That  a  copy  of  these  resolutions  be  transmitted  to  the  family  of  the 
deceased  by  the  Clerk. 

Resolved,  That  this  House,  as  a  further  mark  of  respect  to  the  memory  of  the 
deceased,  do  now  adjourn. 


Remarks  by  Mr.  Poland. 

Mr.  SPEAKER:  I  rise  to  second  the  resolutions  offered  by  the 
gentleman  from  Pennsylvania.  The  town  of  Danville,  where 
Mr.  Stevens  was.  born,  and  the  town  of  Peacham,  in  which  he 
lived  until  he  had  completed  his  education  and  attained  his 
majority,  are  both  adjacent  to  the  town  where  I  reside,  and 
form  a  part  of  the  district  I  have  the  honor  to  represent.  It 
seems  appropriate  that  a  representative  of  Mr.  Stevens's  native 
State  and  the  representative  of  his  native  town  and  county 
should  perform  this  duty,  but  I  regret  that  it  has  fallen  upon 
one  who  had  so  little  personal  knowledge  of  him.  Mr.  Stevens 
removed  from  Vermont  to  Pennsylvania  before  my  birth,  and 
I  became  a  resident  of  his  native  county  but  a  few  years  since, 
and  after  his  youthful  associates  were  nearly  all  gone.  I  met 


10  REMARKS    OF   MR.    POLAND    ON    THE 


him  once  or  twice  in  Yermont  when  he  came  to  visit  his  aged 
mother,  but  except  this  I  never  saw  him  until  I  came  to  the 
Senate  at  the  beginning  of  the  thirty-ninth  Congress.  Since 
I  became  a  member  of  this  House  his  advanced  age  and  broken 
health  prevented  his  active  participation  in  much  of  its  busi 
ness,  and  for  a  great  part  of  the  time  his  attendance  during 
its  sessions.  I  can,  therefore,  do  little  more  than  express  the 
general  estimation  of  his  public  character  and  service  enter 
tained  by  myself  in  common  with  the  people  of  his  native 
State.  I  have  learned  that  the  parents  of  Mr.  Stevens  were 
poor,  and  that  his  education  was  mainly  secured  by  his  own 
energy  and  efforts.  When  he  removed  to  the  State  of  Penn 
sylvania  to  begin  his  career  of  active  manhood  he  went 
among  strangers,  dependent  for  friends,  for  success  in  busi 
ness,  for  professional  or  other  advancement,  for  the  means 
of  living  even,  upon  what  he  might,  by  force  of  his  own 
unaided  efforts  and  ability,  be  able  to  win.  How  hardly  he 
struggled,  how  bravely  he  fought,  how  successfully  he  won 
friends,  professional  distinction,  political  advancement,  name 
and  fame,  we  have  been  told  by  his  long-time  friend  and 
neighbor  and  successor  in  this  House.  His  career  and  his 
success  is  another  instance  of  what  is  so  common  in  this 
country,  but  so  uncommon  in  all  others :  the  attainment  of 
the  highest  professional  and  political  distinction  from  the 
humblest  condition  by  the  mere  force  of  personal  effort  and 
ability. 

Mr.  Stevens  was  another  tribute  to  our  system  of  free  insti 
tutions,  founded  upon  the  equality  of  all  men — institutions 
which  he  loved  so  well,  and  exerted  himself  so  faithfully  to 
extend  and  perpetuate.  That  Mr.  Stevens  was  a  man  of 
marked  ability  has  ever  been  conceded,  as  well  by  his  politi 
cal  opponents  as  by  his  political  and  personal  friends.  He 
had  indomitable  courage,  energy  of  character,  and  tenacious 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        11 

~ 

will;  so  that  when  he  had  once  settled  upon  a  course  of  action 

he  pursued  it  to  the  end  with  an  apparent,  almost  reckless, 
disregard  of  the  opinions  and  judgments  of  other  men.  His 
leading  and  characteristic  ambition  seemed  to  be  to  elevate 
the  masses  of  his  fellow-men.  He  seemed  ever  to  desire  and 
to  labor  that  all  men  should,  have  an  equal  start  and  a  fair 
chance  m  the  race  of  life.  His  early  and  successful  eiforts  in 
his  adopted  State  in  the  cause  of  popular  and  general  educa 
tion  were  an  apt  and  enduring  illustration  of  this  great  trait 
of  his  character.  He  loved  freedom  and  liberty  for  himself, 
and  for  all  men  as  well.  He  hated  every  form  of  tyranny  and 
oppression  which  clogged  and  opposed  the  advancement  of 
men  to  better  conditions;  and  especially  did  he  abhor  and 
detest  that  vast  oppression  which  once  prevailed  in  this 
country  and  which  seemed  likely  to  prevail  forever — human 
slavery.  Accordingly,  when  that  institution  came  to  be  one 
of  the  subjects  of  political  controversy  in  the  country,  he  was 
found  among  its  most  determined  and  advanced  opponents. 
It  is  not  saying  more  than  I  believe  to  be  just  to  him  that  to 
his  efforts  as  much  as  to  those  of  any  one  man  is  the  country 
indebted  for  its  final  overthrow.  When  the  country  had 
become  involved  in  a  civil  war  of  appalling  magnitude  upon 
this  question  of  slavery,  and  the  great  question  of  the  time 
was  whether  the  Union  or  slavery  should  go  down,  Mr. 
Stevens  seemed  to  rise  at  once  to  the  magnitude  and  majesty 
of  the  occasion. 

His  leadership  of  the  Union  men  and  opponents  of  slavery 
and  its  abettors  during  the  period  of  the  war,  in  the  great 
American  Commons,  was  perhaps  as  brilliant  and  successful 
as  the  world  has  ever  seen.  Though  I  have  no  reason  to  doubt 
he  loved  his  country,  its  free  institutions,  and  its  government 
as  Avell  as  others,  I  have  thought  his  great  efforts  in  their 


12  REMARKS    OF    MR.    POLAND    ON    THE 


behalf  during  that  period  were  actuated  as  much  by  his 
hatred  of  slavery  as  by  his  love  of  country. 

I  will  not  further  allude  to  Mr.  Stevens's  congressional  career, 
though  his  public  life  is  mainly  included  in  it,  but  leave 
that  to  others  whose  opportunities  to  know  it  are  so  much 
better  than  my  own.  Mr.  Stevens  had  very  warm  sympathies 
and  great  kindness  of  heart.  No  case  of  suffering  or  distress 
ever  appealed  to  him  in  vain ;  his  heart  and  his  hand  were 
always  open  to  sympathize  with  and  relieve  the  needy  and  the 
downtrodden  of  the  earth. 

I  am  aware  that  since  the  close  of  the  war,  in  dealing  with 
the  subject  of  the  restoration  of  the  revolted  States  and  their 
people,  Mr.  Stevens  has  been  charged  with  entertaining 
malignant  and  uncharitable  feelings,  and  being  influenced  by 
them  in  his  public  action.  So  far  as  this  charge  applies  to 
the  masses  of  the  people  of  those  States,  who  might  well  be 
regarded  as  the  deluded  victims  of  unwise  leaders,  I  have 
never  seen  any  evidence  ofjts  truth.  He  did  regard  the  pro 
moters  and  leaders  of  the  rebellion  as  great  criminals,  who 
ought  to  be  punished  as  such ;  he  felt  a  kind  of  righteous  and 
holy  indignation  against  them,  and  as  if  the  nation  itself  was 
endangered  unless  justice  and  judgment  were  meted  out 
against  them.  Mr.  Stevens  always  retained  a  strong  feeling 
of  attachment  to  his  native  State,  and  a  very  high  regard  for 
her  people.  It  was  a  sufficient  passport  to  his  favor  that  the 
applicant  came  from  Vermont.  So  long  as  his  mother  lived 
he  made  almost  annual  pilgrimages  to  the  old  home  upon  the 
Green  mountains  to  see  to  her  comfort  and  to  visit  the  scenes 
of  his  boyhood.  I  do  not  think  I  ever  met  him  since  I  have 
been  in  Washington  but  he  inquired  about  something  or 
somebody  in  Vermont,  .and  almost  always  had  some  amusing 
anecdote  to  relate  connected  with  his  early  life.  His  strong 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        13 

filial  affection  is  beautifully  shown  by  the  provision  in  his  will 
for  the  annual  planting  of  roses  and  other  cheerful  flowers  at 
the  corners  of  the  graves  of  his  mother  and  brother ;  and  his 
attachment  to  the  scenes  and  memories  of  his  youthful  days 
is  equally  well  exhibited  by  his  bequest  to  the  Juvenile 
Library  Association  of  the  old  Peacharn  Academy,  where  he 
received  his  preparatory  education.  The  people  of  Vermont 
felt  a  just  and  laudable  pride  in  Mr.  Stevens  and  in  his  dis 
tinguished  public  career.  They  watched  his  success,  as  they 
have  many  others  of  her  sons  who  have  gone  out  from  her 
and  attained  position  and  fame  in  other  States.  In  the  case 
of  Mr.  Stevens,  his  public  course  was  generally  such  as  com 
mended  itself  to  their  own  judgment.  Sometimes  he  an 
nounced  doctrines  and  advocated  measures  more  extreme 
than  they  were  prepared  to  accept ;  but  they  ever  felt  that 
for  him  something  was  to  be  pardoned  to  the  spirit  of  liberty. 
The  people  of  Vermont  always  loved  to  believe  that  the 
strong  love  of  freedom  and  independence  for  all  men  exhib 
ited  by  him — his  hatred  of  all  forms  of  oppression,  and  his 
efforts  to  elevate  and  benefit  the  masses,  were,  to  some  extent, 
due  to  his  being  born  in  Vermont.  The  early  history  of  Ver 
mont  was  that  of  a  continual  struggle  against  what  they 
deemed  to  be  unlawful  and  unjust  attempts  of  other  States  to 
obtain  jurisdiction  and  exercise  governmental  power  over 
them.  These  struggles  had  ceased,  to  be  sure,  prior  to  the 
birth  of  Mr.  Stevens ;  but  the  heroes  and  statesmen  who  were 
her  leaders  in  those  trying  days  were  still  alive  and  gave  tone 
and  temper  to  public  sentiment  and  opinion  for  many  years 
after.  We  have  loved  to  believe  in  Vermont  that  the  free 
and  independent  opinions  inhaled  by  him  in  his  youth  with 
the  free  air  of  our  grand  mountains  in  some  degree  con 
tributed  to  make  him  what  he  was  so  emphatically,  the  friend 
of  the  oppressed  and  the  foe  of  the  oppressor.  Like  other 


14       REMARKS  OF  MR.  MOORHEAD  ON  THE 

men,  he  had  his  faults ;  but  he  has  clone  so  much  for  the  great 
cause  of  humanity  that  this  and  all  future  generations  in  this 
land  have  ample  cause  to  Mess  and  revere  his  memory.  To 
show  the  estimate  in  which  Mr.  Stevens  was  held  by  the  peo 
ple  of  Vermont,  I  ask  to  have  the  Clerk  read  the  following 
resolutions,  which  were  unanimously  adopted  by  the  Vermont 
legislature  at  their  recent  session. 
The  Clerk  read  as  follows  : 

Mr.  Varnum,  of  Peacham,  offered  the  following  joint  resolution:    ,• 

Resolved  by  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives,  That  so  great  a  loss  to 
the  nation  as  the  death  of  Hon.  THADDEUS  STEVENS  deserves,  and  should 
receive,  of  the  representatives  of  the  people  of  his  native  State  in  general  assem 
bly  convened,  a  befitting  and  appropriate  recognition. 

Resolved,  That  we  mourn  and  deeply  sympathize  with  those  of  his  adopted 
State,  whom  he  so  faithfully  represented  in  the  councils  of  our  nation,  and  by 
whom  he  was  so  nobly  sustained,  in  this  their  great  bereavement  and  irreparable 
loss,  of  one  so  firm,  so  devoted  to  the  interests,  the  welfare,  and  the  honor  of 
the  people. 

Resolved,  That  his  patriotism,  his  devotion  to  the  principles  of  liberty,  justice, 
and  equality,  his  unswerving  fidelity  to  the  trusts  of  his  State  and  the  trusts 
of  the  Union,  have  left  an  honorable  and  ineffaceable  impression  on  the  pages 
of  history  and  on  the  records  of  a  great  Republic. 

Resolved,  That  we  will  remember  him  as  a  son  of  Vermont,  and  will  cherish 
his  memory,  and  point  with  pride  to  his  life  as  an  example  of  patriotism  for 
ourselves  and  our  posterity. 

Resolved,  That  the  governor  be  requested  to  transmit  a  copy  of  these  resolu 
tions  to  the  governor  of  Pennsylvania.  . 


Remarks  %  Mr.  Moorhead. 

Mr,  SPEAKER:  My  acquaintance  with  Thaddeus  Stevens 
began  during  the  administration  of  Governor  Eitner,  of  Penn 
sylvania,  about  the  year  1836.  He  was  then  a  bold  and  daring 
leader  of  his  party.  Always  in  advance  of  public  opinion,  he 
constantly  antagonized  it  with  a  valor  and  boldness  une 
qualled.  Usually  political  leaders  ascertain  the  current  and 
drift  of  public  sentiment  and  accommodate  themselves  to  it. 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.         15 


Not  so  with  him.  He  formed  his  own  opinions  and  acted  on 
his  own  convictions.  Opposition,  so  far  from  weakening  his 
resolves,  only  nerved  him  for  whatever  effort  was  necessary 
to  the  accomplishment  of  his  purpose.  He  created  public 
opinion  and  moulded  public  sentiment.  In  this,  above  all  other 
traits,  lay  the  greatness  of  Thaddeus  Stevens.  He  was  always 
ready  to  defend  his  views,  never  shrinking  from  any  service 
required  by  his  fidelity  to  duty.  The  victims  overthrown  by 
his  power  and  logic,  and  impaled  by  his  wit,  irony,  and  sar 
casm,  are  legion.  Many  of  them,  like  himself,  have  gone  to 
their  reward;  others  remain,  retaining  a  lively  recollection  of 
the  "  Old  Commoner." 

While  he  was  at  times  terribly  severe,  and  more  rarely  dis 
courteous,  and  sometimes  in  the  intensity  of  political  excite 
ment  wounded  the  feelings  of  his  friends,  yet  at  heart  he  was 
eminently  kind,  generous,  and  forgiving. 

The  history  of  his  public  life  is  before  the  world  ;  his  name 
and  fame  are  a  part  of  the  possession  of  the  people.  While 
free  government  endures  Thaddeus  Stevens  will  be  .remem 
bered  with  honor,  and  his  services  in  its  maintenance  will  be 
recalled  with  gratitude.  But  his  greatest  achievements  were 
undoubtedly  his  agency  in  the  establishment  of  the  common 
school  system  of  Pennsylvania,  and  in  the  emancipation  of 
four  million  slaves.  Both  these  great  measures  would  un 
doubtedly  have  been  adopted  in  time  without  him,  but  both 
were  hastened  by  his  strong  and  able  support. 

When,  a  member  of  the  Pennsylvania  legislature,  in  1833, 
he  commenced  his  public  advocacy  of  free  schools,  many  of 
our  industrious,  frugal,  agricultural  population  believed  that 
every  man  should  take  care  of  his  own  family  and  educate  his 
children  or  not,  as  seemed  to  him  best. 

The  idea  of  taxing  one  man  to  pay  for  schooling  the  children 
of  another  was  looked  upon  by  them  as  an  innovation  and  an 


16       REMARKS  OF  MR.  MOORHEAD  ON  THE 

injustice.  His  constituency  held  a  meeting  and  instructed 
him  to  oppose  the  proposition.  He  boldly  refused,  denounced 
them  for  their  selfishness,  carried  his  measure,  and  also  a 
majority  of  his  constituents  with  him.  The  abolition  of  slavery 
is  too  recent,  and  his  action  too  well  known,  not  only  to  the 
people  of  the  United  States  but  of  the  world,  to  require  any 
comment  of  mine.  I  cannot  refrain,  however,  from  saying 
that  in  1850.  being  a  visitor  in  this  city,  I  obtained  through 
the  courtesy  of  a  friend  admittance  to  the  floor  of  the  House. 
Mr.  Stevens  was  upon  the  floor  at  the  time,  speaking  on  the 
evils  of  slavery.  The  leading  members  from  the  slaveholding 
States  were  gathered  in  front  of  his  desk.  As  he  portrayed 
the  degradation  and  crime  of  slavery  in  such  a  manner  as  he 
only  could  portray  them,  scowls  settled  upon  their  brows,  con 
tempt  curled  their  lips,  and  oaths  could  be  distinctly  heard 
hissing  through  their  teeth.  This  was  in  the  days  when  south 
ern  gentlemen  enforced  their  arguments  with  an  appeal  to  the 
duel,  and  southern  ruffians  resorted  to  the  bowie-knife  and 
bludgeon.  I  felt  alarmed  for  him,  but  he  proceeded  unem 
barrassed  by  interruptions  and  apparently  unconscious  of  the 
mutterings  of  the  storm.  As,  reaching  his  climax,  he  spoke 
of  Virginia,  the  proud  mother  of  Presidents,  become  a  breeder 
of  slaves  for  the  southern  market,  the  anger  of  her  represent 
atives  could  scarcely  be  restrained ;  yet  he  was  as  cool  as  if 
addressing  a  jury  in  his  county  court-house. 

This  conveniently  illustrates  the  last  remark  I  wish  to  make, 
namely,  that  Thaddeus  Stevens  was  pre-eminently  a  brave 
man,  who  would  do  and  dare  everything  in  the  vindication  of 
what  he  believed  to  be  the  truth.  But,  Mr.  Speaker,  he  is 
gone;  peace  be  to  his  ashes.  Vermont  has  the  honor  of  his 
birth,  Pennsylvania  the  more  enduring  honor  of  having 
adopted  him  as  her  son ;  for  were  not  her  valleys  his  home? 
her  temples  of  justice  his  shrine,  her  legislative  halls  his  first 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        17 

political  prize,  her  people  Iris  constituents,  her  interests  his 
study,  her  progress  his  delight,  her  honor  his  glory,  and  is  not 
her  soil  his  grave  I  Let  us  imitate  his  virtues  and  cherish  his 
memory. 


Remarks  by  Mr.  Maynard. 

In  the  awful  presence  of  death  every  voice  is  silent  except 
the  voice  of  sorrow  and  eulogy.  The  infirmities  of  mortality 
are  forgotten,  the  good  alone  is  remembered ;  criticism  is  dis 
armed;  censure  loses  its  power  5  inert  instinctively  concede, 
as  they  expect,  this  sad  immunity  to  the  grave.  It  is,  let  us 
believe,  an  unconscious  prefiguration  of  the  better  life  to  come. 

While  offering  my  tribute  to  the  memory  of  our  venerable 
and  deceased  associate,  the  late  Thaddeus  Stevens,  it  is  proper 
that  I  confine  myself  to  that  portion  of  his  life  spent  in  the 
national  Capitol.  Others  knew  him,  it  may  be,  as  a  student, 
a  teacher,  a  lawyer,  a  neighbor — knew  him  in  the  amenities 
and  benefactions  of  home.  My  acquaintance  with,  him  was 
formed  here,  and  here,  I  may  say  in  this  building,  was  our 
intercourse.  I  met  him  the  first  time  at  the  assembling  of  the 
thirty-sixth  Congress,  in  the  winter  of  1859.  It  was  a  period 
of  great  political  excitement.  The  struggle  had  already  begun 
which  within  less  than  two  years  developed  into  civil  war.  It 
was  a  time  to  call  forth  the  best  efforts  of  the  best  men.  Mem 
bers  then  of  different  political  parties,  we  naturally,  necessa 
rily  perhaps,  pursued  what  wras  felt  to  be  a  common  purpose 
by  different  methods  and  distinct  organizations.  The  scenes 
of  that  Congress  are  not  easily  forgotten.  The  almost  daily 
contests  between  Lovejoy  and  Corwin  and  Stevens  on  the  one 
side,  and  Hindman  and  Barksdale  and  Branch  on  the  other, 
speaking  alone  of  the  dead,  but  settled  the  issues  for  the  com- 
2 


18        REMARKS  OF  MR.  MAYNARD  ON  THE 

ing  years  of  bloodshed  and  carnage.  Some  of  us,  foreseeing 
the  calamitous  time,  interposed  to  stay  the  strife,  praying  that 
if  it  were  possible  this  cup  of  sorrow  might  pass.  Visions  of 
desolated  homes,  of  screaming  women,  famishing  children, 
and  old  men,  the  victims  of  torture ;  fields  laid  waste,  and  all 
that  makes  existence  lovely  perverted — visions  frightfully 
realized — were  ever  present  before  us  whose  people  occupied 
what  we  knew  must  be  the  battle-ground  in  case  of  armed 
conflict.  To  avert  this  terrible  visitation  I  need  not  say  we 
labored  with  all  the  earnestness  of  agonizing  natures.  The 
records  remain  to  tell  of  our  labors.  I  refer  to  them  at  this 
time  and  in  this  connection  to  attest  the  feeling  of  confidence 
we  entertained  toward  Mr.  Stephens.  Armed  though  he  was 
in  completest  panoply,  and  ready  for  every  encounter,  we  all 
felt  that  if  war  should  ensue  it  Avould  not  be  his  generous 
nature  which  would  strike  the  first  blow.  This  is  not  the  occa 
sion  to  dwell  upon  the  remembered  incidents  of  his  intercourse 
with  my  associates — still  speaking  alone  of  the  dead — with 
Gilmer,  of  North  Carolina;  Bouligny,  of  Louisiana;  Bristow 
and  Anderson,  of  Kentucky  j  and  Brabson  and  Hatton,  of  my 
own  State.  It  was  not  the  intercourse  of  men  who  expected 
soon  to  become  enemies.  So  we  separated  at  the  inaugura 
tion  of  Mr.  Lincoln  full  of  anxiety,  yet  not  without  hope. 

When,  the  next  winter,  we  met  again  as  members  of  a  new 
Congress,  all  was  changed.  A  million  of  men  were  in  arms, 
and  the  life  of  the  nation  hung  upon  the  issue  of  battles.  We 
were  both  upon  the  Committee  of  Ways  and  Means,  charged, 
as  the  House  was  at  that  time  organized,  with  the  examina 
tion  of  all  financial  questions,  both  of  revenue  and  expenditure, 
and  with  the  preparation  of  all  revenue  bills,  which,  under  the 
Constitution,  must  originate  in  this  House.  The  expenditures 
of  the  government,  never  less  than  two  millions  a  day,  and 
sometimes  reaching  three  millions,  made  a  demand  upon  the 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        19 

public  resources  wholly  without  precedent  and  greatly  beyond 
what  many  regarded  our  ability  to  meet.  Besides,  interven 
tion  by  at  least  two  of  the  great  European  powers  for  months 
seemed  imminent,  and  a  struggle  between  the  republic  and 
the  united  civilized  world.  And,  what  was  still  more  disheart 
ening  to  one  in  the  position  of  Mr.  Stevens,  he  lacked  confi 
dence  in  the  ability  and  skill  both  of  our  civil  and  military 
leaders,  and  in  some  important  instances  he  had  little  faith  in 
their  devotion  to  the  cause  so  dear  to  the  general  heart.  The 
early  decisions  of  the  field  were  not  always  assuring,  and  even 
here  there  were  not  a  few,  timid  and  unbelieving,  ready  to  flee 
at  the  first  sign  of  irresolution  on  the  part  of  our  leader.  Yet 
neither  on  the  floor  nor  in  the  committee  room  did  his  courage 
once  weaken  or  his  purpose  grow  infirm.  On  the  contrary,  we 
saw  his  energies  increase  with  every  new  emergency,  and  his 
spirit  rise  buoyant  as  those  around  him  became  more  despond 
ing.  Among  the  elements  of  our  final  success  his  unfaltering 
leadership  at  this  cardinal  period  was  not  the  least.  While 
events  Avere  shaping  themselves  and  the  public  judgment  was 
baffled  by  the  novelty  of  the  situation,  weakness,  doubt,  insta 
bility  in  that  quarter  would  have  been  disastrous,  might  have 
been  fatal.  The  unabated  hostility  towards  him  by  the  parti- 
zans  of  the  rebellion  is  explained  only  by  their  consciousness 
of  his  unyielding  and  overmastering  power. 

The  internal  revenue  system,  the  currency  system,  the 
national  bank  system,  the  form  of  the  national  debt  originated 
at  this  juncture  and  under  his  direction.  In  no  instance,  I 
believe,  did  his  individual  views  entirely  prevail,  and  there 
were  points  upon  which  he  was  diametrically  opposed  by  the 
action  of  the  two  houses.  Having  known  his  opinions  at  that 
time,  I  could  easily  appreciate  his  feeling  of  injustice  at  the 
construction  afterward  given  to  certain  scattered  expressions, 


20        REMARKS  OP  MR.  MAYNARD  ON  THE 

used,  possibly,  in  reference  to  the  predominant  sentiments  of 
others  rather  than  to  his  own. 

His  subsequent  career  is  too  recent  and  too  familiar  to  be 
dwelt  upon.  His  theory  of  the  rebellion  and  of  the  legal  con 
sequences  of  its  overthrow,  his  views  upon  reconstruction,  and 
the  part  he  took  in  the  late  contest  for  precedence  between 
the  legislature  and  the  executive  are  well  understood.  Dur 
ing  the  last  year  Ave  all  felt  that  his  sands  had  nearly  run ; 
day  by  day  we  saw  him.  borne  into  the  hall  upon  the  arms  of 
young  men,  weak  as  a  child,  but  eager  and  attentive,  whether 
the  discussion  turned  upon  foreign  or  home  affairs.  No  subject 
was  above  his  grasp,  none  beneath  his  notice.  Treaty  stipula 
tions  with  a  great  power  and  the  salary  of  the  humblest  clerk 
alike  found  in  him  an  advocate.  Toward  the  close  of  the  sum 
mer  session  nature  made  a  final  rally.  For  a  few  days  the 
old  vivacity  returned — the  brilliant  repartee  and  unexpected 
sallies  that  all  enjoyed  so  much.  He  himself  felt  the  renewal 
of  strength  and  a  revival  of  hope  and  the  future.  It  was  the 
last  glimmer  of  the  expiring  flame.  We  had  scarcely  dis 
persed  to  our  distant  homes  before  the  telegraph  announced 
that  he  was  no  more.  And  so  he  passed  away  in  the  mellow 
autumn  of  his  age,  having  lived  to  enjoy  the  ripened  fruits  of 
the  spring-time  planting  and  summer  culture. 

A  maxim  of  one  of  the  sages  would  have  us  wait  until  the 
end  of  life  before  pronouncing  it  happy.  A  historian,  closing 
the  biography  of  one  of  the  illustrious  men  of 'his  time,  ex 
claims,  in  the  spirit  of  this  maxim,  "  Tu  vero  felix,  non  vitcv 
tantum  claritate,  sed  etiam  opportunitate  mortis."  If  a  brilliant 
career  be  a  happy  one,  and  if  that  career  be  brilliant,  which, 
unaided  by  wealth,  family  or  powerful  friends,  attains  the 
front  rank  among  the  great  leaders  of  a  great  epoch  and 
makes  a  name  for  ban  or  blessing  in  every  household  of  the 
land,  then,  indeed,  is  this  champion  of  the  oppressed  to  be 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.         21 


accounted  happy ;  but  thrice  happy  in  the  opportune  article 
of  his  death.  Though  the  strength  of  manhood  was  gone,  the 
babble  and  drivel  of  dotage  had  not  supervened.  He  had 
seen  his  country  emerge,  after  a  long  and  painful  strife,  from 
the  clouds  and  turmoil  of  civil  war,  and  resume  her  place 
among  the  nations,  freer,  richer,  stronger,  happier,  and  more 
honored  than  before  ;  entering  upon  a  new  era  of  prosperity 
and  growth,  excelling  them  all  in  the  splendor  of  her  renown, 
even  as  one  star  excelleth  another  star  in  glory.  The  princi 
ples  for  which  he  had  contended  through  a  lengthened  life  had 
been  recognized  and  adopted.  His  life-work  was  done,  and 
who  shall  say  it  had  not  been  done  well  ?  The  Son  of  David 
has  said  there  is  a  time  to  die ;  a  time  when  to  die  is  better 
than  to  liye ;  and  fortunate  are  they  who  are  summoned  at 
this  auspicious  moment,  permitted  to  attain  the  full  measure 
of  their  fame,  but  not  to  survive  their  reputation  or  their  use 
fulness  to  mankind. 

The  character  of  Mr.  Stevens  I  shall  not  attempt.  To  his 
life-long  friends  its  delineation  will  be  a  work  of  pathetic  pride ; 
I  leave  it  to  them,  remarking  upon  two  traits  which  seemed 
very  prominent.  The  first  was  manliness  as  opposed  to  effem 
inacy.  Not  his 

"The  Dorian  mood 
Of  flutes  and  soft  recorders." 

He  evinced  little  respect  for  mere  taste  and  refinement  and 
delicacy  and  luxury  and  sentiment  and  the  whole  chapter  of 
exquisitism,  but  delighted  rather  in  the  sturdier  qualities  of 
the  heart  and  mind.  The  other  trait  was  his  exceeding  libe 
rality,  extending  alike  to  all,  to  the  unthankful  and  the  evil 
as  well  as  to  the  grateful  and  the  deserving.  Where  could  be 
found  a  more  unselfish  friend  ?  And  never,  surely,  was  there 
a  more  generous  foe.  Oppression  and  distress  never  appealed 
to  him  in  vain.  The  humblest  obscurity  did  not  escape  his 


22        REMARKS  BY  MR.  MAYNARD  ON  THE 


notice.  Opposition  to  slavery  was  a  moral  necessity  of  his 
najajre-^^As  a  legislator  he  was  liberal  to  such  a  degree  that 
his  political  associates  deemed  it  necessary  to  provide  a  coun 
terpoise  in  natures  less  impulsive  and  sympathetic.  His  last 
effort  in  the  House,  if  I  mistake  not,  Avas  an  appeal  for  an 
appropriation  to  the  public  charities  of  the  District  of  Colum 
bia.  Those  who  knew  him  in  the  private  walks  of  life  bear 
testimony  to  his  own  continual  and  abounding  charity,  and 
"  charity  shall  cover  the  multitude  of  sins."  We  cannot  won 
der,  therefore,  that  pious  hands  were  there  to  close  his  dying* 
eyes,  making  intercession  with  Heaven  in  his  behalf,  or  that 
in  the  supreme  hour  devoted  women  should  administer  the 
holy  chrism,  efficacious,  let  us  hope,  beyond  the  teaching  of 
our  creeds. 

To  most  men  there  comes,  sooner  or  later,  a  period  of  inac 
tion,  inability  for  further  progress;  when  the  world  seems 
to  them  incapable  of  becoming  any  better,  and  every  change 
is  dreaded  as  likely  to  be  for  the  worse.  This  is  the  period  of 
conservatism,  and  usually  comes  with  gray  hairs  and  failing 
eye-sight.  It  converses  with  the  past  and  distrusts  the  future. 
Its  look  is  backward  and  not  forward.  This  period  Mr.  Ste 
vens  never  reached.  No  good  was  ever  attained  without  an 
attainable  better.  All  his  life  he  held  the  outposts  of  thought. 
Even  in  his  closing  hours,  we  are  told,  he  found  time  for  dis 
course  of  hopeful  temper  upon  public  affairs  and  to  augur  the 
success  of  an  administration  he  could  hardly  have  expected  to 
see. 

As  he  was,  so  he  will  long  be  remembered.  He  has  left  his 
impress  upon  the  form  and  body  of  the  times.  Monuments 
will  be  reared  to  perpetuate  his  name  on  the  earth.  Art 
will  be  busy  with  her  chisel  and  her  pencil  to  preserve  his 
features  and  the  image  of  his  mortal  frame.  All  will  be  done 
that  brass  and  marble  and  painted  canvas  admit  of  being 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.         23 

done.  The  records  of  his  official  acts  will  remain  in  your 
archives ;  our  chosen  words  of  commemoration  will  fall  into 
the  channels  of  literature.  But  the  influence  of  a  gifted  mind 
in.  moulding1  thought  and  giving  direction  to  events  is  not 
to  be  measured  by  words  of  commemoration  or  by  official 
records.  It  is  as  measureless  as  the  soul  and  enduring  as 
:ime.  Long  after  the  brass  and  marble  and  painted  canvas 
have  disappeared  it  will  still  remain,  transmitted  from  age 
to  age  and  through  successive  generations.  "  Quidquid  ex  eo 
amavimm,  quidquid  mirati  sumus,  manet,  mansurumque  est  in 
animis  liomimnn,  in  ceternitate  temporum,  fama  rerum.  Posteri- 
tati,  narratus  et  traditus,  superstes  erit."  . 


Remarks  by  Mr.  Kelley. 

Mr.  SPEAKER  :  Thaddeus  Stevens  was  one  of  the  most  prac 
tical  of  men,  though  his  whole  life  was  colored  and  influenced 
by  a  vision.  Timid  men,  and  those  who  were  without  faith, 
called  him  dogmatic  and  impracticable,  and  others  spoke  of 
him  as  a  theorist,  who,  to  gratify  a  malignant  or  vindictive 
spirit,  urged  extreme  measures  regardless  of  the  rights,  inter 
ests,  or  sentiments  of  those  they  were  to  affect.  They  knew 
but  little  of  the  man  they  judged.  How  thoroughly  practical 
he  was  is  attested  by  the  fact  that  he  earned  by  teaching  the 
rudimentary  branches  the  means  to  procure  his  collegiate 
training ;  that  having  settled  in  a  community  in  which  hered 
itary  wealth  was  deemed  a  prerequisite  to  a  respectable  posi 
tion  at  the  bar,  he  made  no  concealment  of  his  poverty,  and 
taught  school  while  preparing  for  the  practice  of  the  legal  pro 
fession  and  the  acknowledged  leadership  of  the  bar  of  a  large 
section  of  his  adopted  State ;  that  he  commanded  the  confi 
dence  of  every  judge  before  whom  he  appeared  in  his  extended 


24        REMARKS  BY  MR.  KELLEY  ON  THE 


range  of  practice,  and  secured  the  affectionate  regard  of  all 
his  young  professional  brethren;  by  the  frequency  with  which 
the  people  among  whom  he  settled,  whether  of  the  York,  the 
Adams,  or  the  Lancaster  district,  required  him,  at  whatever 
sacrifice  of  prejudice  on  their  part  or  of  pecuniary  interest  on 
his,  to  represent  them  in  the  legislatures  of  the  State  and 
nation,  and  conventions  summoned  for  the  consideration  of 
the  gravest  topics ;  and,  above  all,  by  the  commanding  influ 
ence  he  exercised  in  every  deliberative  assembly  of  which  he 
was  a  member. 

I  heard  a  prominent  member  of  the  38th  Congress  say  of 
Mr.  Stevens:  "  Let  him  go  in  what  direction  he  may,  it  is 
always  to  the  extreme;"  implying  waywardness  and  inconsist 
ency,  and,  in  so  far,  misjudging  him.  He  never  labored  in 
adverse  directions.  He  sometimes  accepted  and  supported 
propositions  which  were  in  general  accord  with  his  views,  but 
to  which  he  could  not  yield  unqualified  assent.  He  did  this, 
as  he  once  said,  "  because  Congress  is  composed  of  men,  and 
not  of  angels/'  He  was  incapable  of  acting  inconsistently 
upon  measures  involving  general  principles.  Against  this 
reproach  he  was  almost  divinely  panoplied.  He  had  in  his 
boyhood  dreamed  of  a  republic  broader,  grander,  and  more 
beneficent  than  the  republic  of  Plato  or  the  Utopia  of  Sir 
Thomas  More— a  republic  in  which  every  citizen  might  know 
the  chastening  influence  of  the  family  relations  and  the  joys 
of  home  and  pursue  the  secrets  of  science  and  the  pleasures 
of  literature ;  and  believing,  as  he  continued  to  do,  in  the  pro 
gress  of  our  race  and  the  perfectibility  of  our  institutions, 
his  public  life  was  devoted  to  the  realization  of  this,  his  boy 
hood's  beautiful  dream.  When  he  dedicated  himself  to  this 
work,  in  which  he  never  faltered,  the  southern  boundary  of 
our  country  was  near  the  31st  degree  of  latitude,  and  the 
course  of  the  Mississippi  defined  its  western  limits  ;  but  he 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        25 

believed  that  the  inspiring  truths  expressed  in  the  Declaration 
of  Independence,  and  embodied  in  our  State  and  federal  con 
stitutions,  would  regenerate  all  the  governments  on  the 
continent. 

At  the  time  of  his  birth  the  mouth  of  the  Mississippi  and 
the  shores  of  the  Gulf  of  Mexico  Avere  under  the  dominion  of 
foreign  potentates.  He  was,  however,  old  enough  to  under 
stand  and  remember  the  discussion  that  attended  our  first 
acquisition  of  territory — the  Louisiana  purchase — which  ex 
tended  from  the  Gulf  along  the  west  bank  of  the  Mississippi 
to  the  Lake  of  the  Woods;  and  though  sometimes  disapproving 
of  the  means  by  which  they  were  gained,  he  welcomed  each  of 
the  several  acquisitions  of  territory  by  which  our  country  has 
come  to  stretch  from  ocean  to  ocean,  to  have  a  longer 
and  more  valuable  coast  line  on  the  Pacific  than  any  other 
nation,  and  to  encircle  the  Gulf  from  Cape  Sable  to  the  Rio 
Grande.  Every  successive  acquisition  confirmed  his  faith  and 
nerved  his  purpose. 

The  theory  of-  Mr.  Stevens's  ideal  republic  aAvarded  home 
and  culture  to  each  industrious  citizen.  With  this  generous 
theory  slavery  was  incompatible,  and  he  was,  consequently, 
the  sworn  and  unrelenting  foe  of  that  accursed  institution.  He 
did  not  wage  war  upon  slavery  because  he  envied  the  wealth 
and  power  of  the  master.  He  was  wont  to  thank  God  for 
having  blessed  his  youth  with  poverty,  and  was  ever  ready  to 
confront  the  haughty  master  because  his  great  heart  sympa 
thized  with  the  outraged  and  helpless  slave. 

The  severance  of  the  Union  would  have  dispelled  Mr. 
Stevens's  faith  in  the  ultimate  redemption  of  the  laboring 
people  of  the  world  from  the  ignorance  and  ill-paid  toil  to 
which  they  have  ever  been  subjected.  The  breaking  out  of  the 
slaveholders'  rebellion  seemed  to  rejuvenate  him  and  inspire 
hiln  with  superhuman  strength.  He  was  always  in  his  seat ; 


26         RFMARKS  BY  MR.  KELLEY  ON  THE 

and  when  sessions  Avere  so  far  protracted,  as  they  sometimes 
were  during  the  37th,  38th,  and  39th  Congresses,  that  daylight 
came  and  dimmed  the  artificial  light  in  this  hall,  the  old  man's 
pungent  witticisms  would  rouse  many  of  the  younger  members 
from  drowsiness  and  prostration.  To  maintain  the  Union  he 
would  have  exhausted  the  country's  resources  in  men  and 
materials  of  war  j  and  when  the  rebellion  had  been  crushed  he 
proposed  measures  that,  had  they  been  adopted,  would  have 
eradicated  its  cause  and  rendered  its  recurrence  impossible. 

He  did  not  propose  confiscation  as  a  punishment  to  those 
whose  great  crime  merited  it.  He  was  incapable  of  a  vindic 
tive  act.  He  regarded  the  system  of  land  monopoly,  which 
had  prevailed  in  the  south,  as  the  essential  support  of  slavery, 
and  he  would  obliterate  it.  He  knew  that  the  rebel  leaders 
were  conquered  but  not  subdued,  and  appreciating  the  power 
they  derived  from  the  ownership  of  the  land  on  which  the 
body  of  the  people  were  to  labor  and  live,  he  would  deprive 
them  of  that  power.  He  knew  that  the  labor  of  the  slave  had 
given  the  land  of  the  south  its  value,  and  he  would  reward  the 
freedrnan  by  giving  him  a  homestead  as  a  slight  return  for  the 
unrequited  work  he  had  done  while  a  slave.  He  knew  that 
the  loyal  soldier  had  saved  the  soiith  to  the  Union  and 
freedom,  and  he  would  invite  him  to  dwell  under  his  own  vine 
in  its  midst,  and  by  his  counsels  assist  in  its  future  government. 
He  knew  that  a  landed  aristocracy  and  a  landless  class  are 
alike  dangerous  in  a  republic,  and  by  a  single  act  of  justice 
he  would  abolish  both.  Such  were  the  humane  considerations 
which  prompted  him  to  propose  and  support  measures  which 
the  weak  and  time-serving  denounced  as  harsh  and  vindictive. 

The  system  of  labor  for  wages,  as  it  is  exemplified  in  Great 
Britain  and  on  the  Continent,  is  as  inconsistent  with  his  ideal 
republic  as  slavery.  Contemplating  the  ever-increasing  vol. 
ume  of  pauperism  in  the  British  islands,  and  the  unnatural 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.         27 


and  excessive  toil  demanded  from  women  in  the  coal  mines 
of  England  and  Belgium,  and  from  tender  children  of  agri 
cultural  laborers  in  the  fen-gangs  of  England,  his  emotions 
might  have  been  expressed  in  the  indignant  exclamation  of 
the  Abbe  de  la  Mennais,  "  But  for  labor  at  wages  there  is  110 
name  out  of  hell."  That  is  not  the  freedom  of  which  he  had 
dreamed,  which  deprives  childhood  of  its  buoyancy,  home  of 
its  charms,  and  supplants  intelligent  and  sturdy  youth  by 
ignorance  and  premature  decrepitude,  or  binds  the  families  of 
laborious  artisans  to  a  given  locality  by  their  interest  in  the 
parish  poor  rates,  or  such  inadequate  wages  as  preclude  the 
possibility  of  saving  a  sum  sufficient  for  their  own  transport 
ation  to  better  markets  for  their  labor. 

Mr.  Stevens  always  believed  that  fidelity  to  republican 
principles  required  government  to  protect  those  whose  toil  is 
the  source  of  all  prosperity  against  the  wrongs  and  woes 
endured  by  the  laboring  people  of  countries  in  which  social 
distinctions  are  recognized  by  law,  and  ancient  evils  are 
regarded  as  vested  rights;  and  with  what  steadiness  and 
power  he  endeavored  to  protect  the  wages  of  the  American 
workman,  by  the  imposition  of  adequate  duties  on  the  pro 
ductions  of  the  under-paid  laborers  of  Europe,  every  gentle 
man  on  this  floor  knows.  But  he  was  no  foe  to  commerce. 
In  the  republic  his  youthful  imagination  pictured  nature  lent 
all  her  aids  to  the  people.  The  fields  gave  forth  rich  har 
vests  ;  the  mines  yielded  their  precious  or  useful  stores  5  and 
each  mountain  stream,  as  it  sped  its  way  to  the  sea,  lightened 
the  burden  of  man  by  moving  machinery  which  he  guided 
without  exhausting  labor.  The  consumer  and  the  producer 
were  neighbors,  the  most  perfect  means  of  transportation 
facilitated  exchanges  of  commodities,  and  the  taxes  imposed 
by  middle  men  and  the  many  agents  required  by  trade  with 
distant  nations  were  saved  to  the  producer. 


28  REMAKES    BY    MR.    KELLEY    ON    THE 

Whether  in  the  legislature  of  Pennsylvania  or  the  Congress 
of  the  United  States,  no  project  for  the  development  of  latent 
resources  or  improved  transportation  that  came  within  his 
conception  of  constitutional  limits  ever  failed  for  the  want  of 
his  support.  In  view  of  our  almost  limitless  range  of  climate 
and  soil,  and  boundless  and  diversified  agricultural  and  min 
eral  resources,  he  regarded  our  country  as  sufficient  not  only 
for  its  present  population,  but  for  hundreds  of  millions  of  peo 
ple  in  the  enjoyment  of  every  material  comfort  and  the  refine 
ments  of  a  better  than  Augustan  age.  Regarding  our  country 
as  the  refuge  of  all  who  could  flee  from  the  inequalities  of 
other  lands,  and  the  intelligence  of  the  people  as  essential  to 
the  perpetuity  of  our  institutions,  he  held  it  to  be  the  primary 
duty  of  the  State  to  insure  the  proficiency  of  every  child  in 
"orthography,  reading,  writing,  grammar,  and  arithmetic, 
which,  by  the  experience  of  the  world,  are  pronounced  to 
be  the  rudimental  branches  of  all  knowledge."  He  would 
not  consent  to  withhold  the  privileges  of  an  elector  from  a 
man  because  he  was  illiterate,  and  thus  punish  him  because 
the  State  had  not  done  its  duty  by  him  in  childhood ;  but  he 
proposed  that  the  government  should  provide  school-houses, 
teachers,  and  other  appliances  for  the  education  of  all  chil 
dren,  and  then  further  enact  "that  no  father  or  guardian  shall 
be  permitted  to  vote  at  any  election  for  any  public  officer 
who  shall  not  have  caused  at  least  one-half  of  the  number 
of  his  children  or  wards,  between  the  ages  of  five  and  fifteen 
years,  or  if  he  have  but  one,  that  one,  to  attend  school  during 
at  least  eight  months  within  each  of  the  years  they  are  enti 
tled  to  attend  school." 

To  those  who  believe  that  the  thing  that  has  been  is  the 
the  thing  that  shall  be  forever,  and  that  that  youthful  giant, 
the  American  Republic,  shall  never  escape  from  the  leading- 
strings  in  which  he  has  consented  to  be  held  by  those  bed-rid- 


LIFE  AND  CHAKACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        29 

den  hags,  the  monarchies  of  Europe,  these  theories  of  Mr. 
Stevens,  doubtless,  sound  like  the  ravings  of  one  bereft  of  rea 
son.    But  those  who  know  the  attractive  influence  of  power, 
and  that  the  theatre  of  our  action  is  a  virgin  continent,  with 
lakes,  rivers,  and  coast  lines  capable  of  accommodating  in  our 
internal   or  domestic   commerce   a   commercial    marine   far 
greater  than  that  which  now  carries  the  commerce  of  the 
world,  will  regard  them  as  the  sure  prophesy  of  the  future 
that  is  before  us.    Mr.  Stevens  believed  in  the  possibility  of 
the  commercial  independence  of  the  United  States.    He  also 
knew  that  when  that  should  be  achieved  the  people  could 
bring  their  domestic  relations  into  harmony  Avith  the  funda 
mental  ideas  of  their  republican  government.    Wise  men  will 
not  think  of  him  as  a  visionary  because  he  anticipated  coming- 
events   and   proposed  beneficent  changes  before  the  public 
mind  was  ripe  for  their  reception.    A  great  truth  bravely 
uttered  is  never  inopportune.    ]^or  do  time  and  age  blunt  the 
aptness  of  such  utterances;  and  the  advanced  propositions 
and  fervid  words  with  which  Thaddeus   Stevens  so  often 
stirred  our  blood  and  swayed  our  judgment  Avill  shape  the 
future  of  the  country.    When  the  age  is  riper  other  lips  will 
echo  them  with  persuasive  and  conclusive  force.     Then  the 
American  people,  instead  of  asking  the  little  nationalities  of 
Europe  what  they  may  do,  will  dictate  the  internal  policy 
those  nations  must  adopt  on  pain  of  seeing  their  most  valuable 
citizens,  allured  by  our  happier  condition,  come  to  swell  the 
power  and  grandeur  of  the  great  republic.     Then  will  his 
dream  be  fulfilled,  and  then  will  the  world  behold  the  fitting 
monument  of  Pennsylvania's  greatest  statesman,  Thaddeus 
Stevens. 


30  REMARKS    BY    MR.    WOOD    ON    THE 


Remarks  by  Mr.   Wood. 

Mr.  SPEAKER,  I  feel  no  embarrassment  in  rising  to  unite 
my  voice  with  those  who  thus  appropriately  pay  this  last 
public  tribute  of  respect  to  the  memory  of  our  late  distin 
guished  associate.  The  wide  divergence  in  opinion  between 
us  on  the  leading  questions  of  the  times  cannot  deter  me  from 
the  expression  of  a  just  homage  to  his  character  as  a  man, 
whether  considered  as  a  citizen  or  as  a  statesman. 

As  when  living  we  recognized  him  as  one  of  the  foremost 
intellects  in  this  House,  so  now,  that  being  dead,  let  us  forget 
the  controversies  which  divided  us  and  remember  only  the 
higher  qualities  and  personal  attributes  which  have  at  all 
times  commanded  our  attention. 

The  great  poet  has  said : 

"  The  evil  that  men  do  lives  after  them : 
The  good  is  oft  interred  with  their  bones." 

Would  that  the  reverse  of  this  was  true,  so  that  the  ill 
which  men  do  should  be  buried  with  their  bones,  that  the 
good,  and  the  good  only,  will  live  after  them. 

Mr.  Speaker,  this  is,  indeed,  an  interesting  occasion,  not 
only  in  the  performance  of  these  rites  and  the  personal 
remembrances  it  recalls,  but  in  the  contemplations  and  reflec 
tions  it  involuntarily  forces  upon  the  mind.  It  has  been  said 
that  the  disappointments  in  life  are  many  and  the  successes 
tragically  few.  While  this  may  apply  to  men  in  the  aggre 
gate,  history  and  observation  teach  that  the  special  man  may 
make  conquests  from  time,  surmounting  difficulties,  and 
attain  the  objects  of  his  ambition.  The  sorrows,  the  trials, 
and  tribulations  of  the  general  man  result  from  the  confi 
dence  reposed  in  and  the  deferred  hopes  of  the  eternal  to-mor 
row  ;  while  the  triumphs  of  the  special  man  may  infallibly  be 
traced  to  his  earnest  action  in  the  ever-living  present — in  the 
realities  of  to-day!  Time  is  always  capricious  and  often 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.         31 


deceitful!  To  the  youthful  it  is  full  of  hope  and  golden 
promise.  In  the  aged  it  fosters  those  fond  anticipations,  but 
prolongs  their  realization;  and  while  human  expectation  is 
most  sanguine,  it  coquets  with  our  hopes,  and,  it  may  be,  flits 
from  our  grasp. 

The  force  and  reason  of  these  remarks  are  happily  illustrated 
by  the  life  and  example  of  that  exalted  citizen  whose  memory 
we  now  celebrate,  to  whose  intellect  and  personal  worth  we 
now  pay  homage.  With  him  there  was  no  to-morrow  in  life. 
He  was  truthful  to  his  instincts,  to  his  nature,  and  his  public 
career  displayed  the  increasing  activity  of  an  ever-present 
to-day. 

Mr.  Stevens  was  a  man  of  rare  natural  mental  power,  which, 
together  with  much  self-reliance  and  entire  independence  of 
character,  rendered  him  at  once  the  formidable  and  successful 
leader.  He  relied  upon  these  qualities  more  than  upon  the 
common  resources  of  inferior  men  who  yield  to  the  errors  and 
prejudices  of  the  times  rather  than  suffer  defeat.  Himself  a 
man  of  conviction,  but  not  of  policy,  he  despised  those  who 
sacrificed  the  former  to  the  latter. 

A  bold  thinker,  and  yet  bolder  actor,  he  had  no  patience 
with  those  who  have  no  higher  idea  of  the  noble  profession  of 
politics  than  to  obtain  success  by  any  means  and  at  every 
hazard.  Of  a  self-reliant  temperament,  he  would  not  conform 
to  the  prevailing  conventionalism  of  the  day.  He  was  a  candid 
man.  Whatever  mistakes  of  j udgment  the  world  may  attribute 
to  him,  they  were  not  assumed  for  a  purpose.  Caring  little 
for  popular  favor  or  prejudice,  he  pursued  the  even  tenor  of 
his  way,  enforcing  the  doctrines  he  advocated  with  an  earnest- 
nes§  and  power  which  no  man  could  have  done  who  did  not' 
himself  earnestly  and  honestly  believe  them  to  be  right.  He 
utterly  contemned  deception  and  hypocrisy.  Those  of  us  who 
served  with  him  on  committees,  and  who  were  brought  into 


32       REMARKS  OF  MR.  BROOMALL  ON  THE 

requent  personal  intercourse  with  him,  will  bear  testimony  to 
the  frankness  and  manlin ess  of  his  bearin g.  Though  tenacious 
in  adhering  to  his  own  view,  he  granted  the  largest  indulgence 
to  the  views  of  others  in  the  discussions  in  this  House. 

Well,  indeed,  may  it  be  said  of  him  that  he  was  a  special  man, 
an  embodiment  of  original  personal  individuality.  Whether 
his  influence  was  exercised  for  the  good  of  his  country  this  is 
not  the  occasion  to  discuss,  nor  can  it  be  supposed  that  the 
present  moment  can  well  decide.  Identified  with  the  present 
revolutionary  era,  in  which  he  was  one  of  the  chief  revolution 
ists  and  most  prominent  leaders,  time,  and  time  only,  can 
determine  whether  the  talents  and  characteristics  to  which  I 
have  referred  were  of  injury  or  benefit  to  his  country.  In  my 
judgment,  this  generation  will  not  survive  their  unfortunate 
influence.  Be  that  as  it  may,  he  is  gone — and  gone  forever. 
He  has  passed  to 

"The  undiscover'd  country,  from  whose  bourne 
No  traveller  returns." 

That  he  has  left  his  impress  upon  the  present  page  of  history 
none  can  dispute ;  that  he  possessed  many  manly  qualities  none 
can  deny ;  that  he  was  a  thoroughly  honest,  as  well  as  a  truly 
great  man,  all  will  admit.  Let  us  pass  him  to  the  grave  as  we 
hope  others  will  pass  ourselves — forgetting  the  frailties  incident 
to  our  natures,  and  which  appear  to  be  inseparably  connected 
with  our  being. 


Remarks  by  Mr.  Broomall. 

Mr.  SPEAKER:  Few  statesmen  of  any  country  have  main 
tained  throughout  a  long  public  life  the  steadfast  adherence 
to  principles  laid  down  in  early  manhood  which  characterized 
Thaddeus  Stevens.  Universal  education,  equality  of  human 
rights,  the  elevation  of  the  weak,  the  poor,  and  the  oppressed 
were  not  more  ardent  aims  and  objects  to  him  when  he  first 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        33 

.   ~ 

^_     ^^_    ,_^^,_,_^,_^^,^^^_ -~^-^^~^^-^~    -J-^-    -,v_^ .----^- — -     -  — —- .  -^-^-^ _-~-^ - 

espoused  the  cause  of  human  progress  than  when  three-quar 
ters  of  a  century  had  rendered  his  infirm  body  an  ill  match 
for  his  still  young  and  vigorous  mind. 

Too  frequently  in  men  of  all  stations  the  generous  impulses 
and  noble  sentiments  of  youth  give  place,  with  advancing 
years  and  prosperity,  to  that  fossil  petrefaction  of  humanity 
called  conservatism,  which  is  nothing  more  than  the  want  of 
ability  to  see  the  line  of  progress  marked  out  by  the  hand  of 
Omnipotence  and  the  Avant  of  energy  to  follow  it.  But  this 
dry  rot  of  the  soul  never  tainted  Thaddeus  Stevens.  One  of 
the  last  acts  of  his  old  age  was  the  preparation  of  a  plan  for 
thorough  and  universal  education  in  the  District  of  Columbia, 
and  among  the  first  of  his  early  manhood  was  the  patronage, 
almost  the  parentage,  of  the  common  school  system  of  Penn 
sylvania.  Those  who  have  heard  him  within  a  year,  and 
when  he  required  support  to  stand,  denounce,  as  we  know 
how  he  could  denounce,  the  bare  suggestion  of  reconstructing 
the  south  without  providing  for  universal  suffrage,  are  irre 
sistibly  carried  back  to  the  period  long  years  before  when  he 
stood  up,  almost  alone,  in  the  constitutional  convention  of  his 
adopted  State,  the  advocate  of  the  cause  of  self-government 
against  those  who  found  it  prudent  silently  to  outvote  the 
man  they  did  not  dare  to  answer.  In  contrasting  the  two 
pictures  the  mind  is  led  to  believe  and  to  wonder  that  in  the 
lapse  of  thirty  years  the  man  had  grown  no  older. 

His  conduct  in  that  convention  is  a  lesson  to  the  young 
statesmen  of  his  country.  The  cause  of  universal  suffrage 
which  he  espoused  was  then  an  unpopular  one,  and  there 
seemed  little  prospect  of  its  ever  being  otherwise.  The  slave 
holders  of  the  south  had  long  seen  that  if  the  voice  of  the 
black  man  could  be  heard  in  the  north  their  hold  upon  their 
human  chattels  would  in  time  become  insecure.  With  their 
.usual  sagacity  they  had  induced  northern  politicians  by  flattery 
3 


34       REMARKS  OF  MR.  BROOMALL  ON  THE 

arid  patronage  to  enter  their  services  as  voluntary  bondsmen. 
These  bondsmen  had  created  a  public  sentiment  in  the  north 
which  assigned  to  the  black  man  a  condition  something 
between  man  and  brute,  or  rather  a  condition  sometimes  the 
one  and  sometimes  the  other,  as  best  suited  their  southern 
masters :  man  as  an  element  of  political  power  in  his  owner, 
man  for  the  purposes  of  accountability  and  punishment,  brute 
for  all  other  purposes. 

When  the  Pennsylvania  convention  of  1838  sat,  this  public 
sentiment  was  at  its  height,  and  that  body  was  made  up,  to  a 
large  extent,  of  these  voluntary  bondsmen.  True  to  their 
vassalage  they  hastened  to  record  their  servility  to  the  slave 
power  by  silencing,  as  they  believed  forever,  the  voice  and  the 
vote  of  the  black  man  in  the  councils  of  the  State.  They 
thought  it  safe  to  do  this.  The  victims  were  the  few,  the  poor, 
and  the  powerless.  It  was  in  vain  that  Stevens  and  those 
who  felt  with  him  protested  against  the  shame  and  the  wrong. 
The  deed  was  done.  Thousands  of  American  citizens  were 
disfranchised;  and  that,  too.  upon  the  spot  where  Penn,  a 
century  and  a  half  before,  had  founded  the  purest  system  of 
self-government  the  world  up  to  that  time  had  ever  witnessed; 
upon  the  spot  where  the  fathers  of  the  revolution  sixty  years 
before  had  declared  that  all  men  are  born  free  and  equal,  and 
had  bound  themselves  by  the  most  solemn  obligation  to  write 
that  holy  sentence  upon  American  annals  with  their  blood. 
But  when  the  work  of  the  convention  was  complete,  and  the 
organic  law  came  to  be  signed  by  the  members,  he  who  had 
done  so  much  to  make  it  in  other  respects  what  it  is,  refused 
to  give  it  the  sanction  of  his  name,  and  to  this  day  the  consti 
tution  of  1838  remains  in  the  archives  of  Pennsylvania  with 
one  vacant  seal. 

Yet  the  man  whose  name  should  be  there  lived  to  aid  in 
abolishing  the  institution  in  whose  interests  Pennsylvania  had 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.         35 

_^-.-,-.-^-^-^^-  -^- — — 

sacrificed  her  honor,  and  to  see  universal  suffrage  made  the 
cardinal  principle  of  American  institutions.  That  missing 
name  will  be  remembered  with  gratitude  when  the  names  and 
principles  of  those  who  so  degraded  their  State  have  long  been 
consigned  to  merited  oblivion.  Let  the  future  statesmen  of 
America  learn  that  it  is  never  safe  to  do  wrong.  Retributive 
justice  is  sometimes  slow,  but  it  is  always  sure. 

The  memory  of  Thaddeus  Stevens  needs  no  monument.  The 
imprint  of  his  mind  is  upon  the  history  of  his  country,  and  is 
more  ineffaceable  there  than  would  be  the  image  of  his  body 
upon  marble.  He  was  among  the  first  to  see  that  the  contest 
into  which  we  were  forced  in  1861  was  war,  not  mere  insur 
rection  to  be  suppressed  in  sixty  days,  and  that  it  must  end 
in  victory  upon  one  side  or  the  other  with  all  its  rights  and 
disabilities.  When  that  contest  was  at  last  over  he  was  among 
the  first  to  see  that  all  civil  relations  pre-existing  between  the 
victors  and  the  vanquished  had  ceased  to  be,  leaving  the  latter 
wholly  without  civil  government.  Brushing  away  the  inge 
nious  sophistries  with  which  a  faithless  administration  sought 
to  bewilder  the  public  mind  in  the  interests  of  a  fallen  insti 
tution,  he  set  about  the  work  of  reconstructing  the  conquered 
country  in  the  interests  of  loyalty,  progress,  and  the  rights  of 
man.  To  him  more  than  to  any  other  single  individual  is 
attributable  the  fact  that  eight  States  of  the  Union  have  been 
organized  upon  the  basis  of  universal  suffrage  and  three  more 
are  about  to  be.  As  long  as  self-goverement  shall  remain  a 
principle  dear  to  the  American  heart,  Thaddeus  Stevens  will 
be  remembered  as  its  great  champion.  He  needs  no  monu 
ment,  yet  Pennsylvania  owes  a  tribute  to  her  departed  states 
man.  The  time  will  come,  and  that  speedily,  when  she  will 
purge  her  organic  law  of  all  traces  of  the  unhallowed  institu 
tion,  all  evidences  of  her  former  vassalage.  From  a  human 
stand-point  it  would  seem  that  Thaddeus  Stevens  should  have 


36  REMARKS    OF    MR.    ASHLEY    ON    THE 

witnessed  that  event;  but  it  suited  the  purposes  of  an  Inscruta 
ble  Power  to  decree  otherwise.  Let  his  beloved  State  do  for  him 
what  he  did  not  live  to  do  for  himself.  When  that  day  comes 
let  the  Governor  of  Pennsylvania,  by  virtue  of  a  solemn  act  of 
her  legislature,  on  some  day  sacred  to  the  cause  of  humanity, 
in  the  presence  of  all  that  is  great  and  good  within  her  borders, 
take  from  her  archives  the  constitution  of  1838,  and  reverently, 
with  humiliation  for  the  past  and  hope  for  the  future,  blot  out 
forever  the  discrimination  between  man  and  man  which  God 
never  made,  and  opposite  the  vacant  seal  write  the  name  of 
Thaddeus  Stevens.  Then  will  be  accomplished  what  he  lived 
for.  Then  will  Pennsylvania  be  worthy  to  account  him  among 
the  sons  she  has  loved,  honored,  and  mourned. 

I  cannot  conclude  the  few  remarks  I  arose  to  offer  better  than 
by  quoting  the  language  of  my  deceased  colleague  himself,  in 
this  hall,  upon  the  announcement  of  the  death  of  Mr.  Noell, 
of  Missouri,  whom  he  knew  and  with  whom  he  sympathized : 

Other  men  more  eloquent  than  he  may  have  been  called  to  the  bar  of  judgment, 
but  no  man  ever  appeared  before  that  dread  tribunal  with  more  numerous  and 
ardent  advocates.  His  advocates  were  the  oppressed  of  every  nation,  the 
crushed  of  the  satanic  institution  of  slavery. 

Who  would  not  rather  take  his  chance  in  the  great  day  of  accounts,  before 
that  Judge  who  is  the  acknowledged  Father  of  all  men,  than  the  chance  of 
ordained  hypocrites,  miserable  wretches  who,  professing  to  hold  a  commission 
from  on  m'gh,  impiously  proclaim  slavery  a  divine  institution? 


Remarks  %  Mr.  Ashley. 

Mr.  SPEAKER:  In  the  death  of  Thaddeus  Stevens  this  House 
has  lost  one  of  its  recognized  leaders,  and  the  nation  one  of 
her  most  distinguished  sons.  In  his  departure  we  shall  miss 
another  of  the  uncompromising  heroes  of  our  anti-slavery  rev 
olution.  Elijah  and  Owen  Lovejoy  are  entombed;  the  one  at 
Alton,  and  the  other  at  Princeton,  Illinois.  Adams  and  Pier- 
pout  sleep  beneath  the  soil  of  their  native  Massachusetts; 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.         37 

Theodore  Parker  at  Florence,  in  Italy;  William  Leggett  at 
New  Rochelle,  New  York ;  Nathaniel  P.  Rogers  by  his  native 
Merrimac ;  Gamaliel  Bailey  within  the  shadow  of  the  national 
Capitol;  Giddings  and  Morris  and  Lewis  in  Ohio;  James  G. 
Birney  in  New  Jersey ;  David  Wilmot  and  James  Mott  in 
Pennsylvania;  John  Brown  at  North  Elba,  New  York;  and 
there  are  others  whose  lives  were  as  heroic  and  beautiful  and 
unselfish,  whose  names  I  do  not  now  recall.  To  these  must 
be  added  more  than  300,000,  the  fallen  heroes  and  martyrs  of 
our  liberating  army,  who  sleep  on  every  national  battle-field 
from  the  heights  of  Gettysburg  to  the  banks  of  the  Rio  Grande. 
Pre-eminent  among  all  this  invincible  army  of  heroes,  prophets, 
and  martyrs  is  Abraham  Lincoln, 

The  generous,  merciful,  and  just. 

With  this  grand  army  of  unselfish  patriots,  his  contempora 
ries  and  colaborers,  we  have  laid  down  to  rest  all  that  is  mortal 
of  our  friend  in  the  bosom  of  his  beloved  Pennsylvania. 

The  benediction  of  millions  followed  him  to  his  tomb,  and 
to-day  in  the  free  home  of  every  black  man,  and  of  all  men 
who  love  liberty,  there  is  sincere  sorrow  and  mourning. 

Never  again  in  these  council  halls  will  he  deliberate  with 
the  people's  representatives,  nor  awaken  the  nation  from  its 
lethargy  by  his  genius  and  wonderful  power. 

The  honorable  gentleman  whom  his  constituents  have 
elected  to  succeed  him  on  this  floor,  and  those  who  have  pre 
ceded  me,  have  spoken  so  fully  of  his  early  life,  his  heroic 
struggles,  and  his  personal  history,  that  I  need  not  add  a  single 
word. 

Through  some  of  the  most  eventful  years  in  our  history  I 
have  been  intimately  associated  with  him  on  this  floor.  During 
all  that  time,  which  included  the  darkest  hours  in  the  nation's 
life — hours  which  tested  the  constancy  and  courage  of  men— 
he  bore  himself  with  such  unquestioned  fidelity  to  the  cause 


38  EEMAEKS    OF    MR.    ASHLEY    ON    THE 


of  human  freedom  as  to  command  even  the  respect  of  political 
opponents  and  the  cordial  endorsement  of  all  liberty-loving  men. 
As  we  engage  in  the  memorial  services  of  this  hour,  and 
bear  him  again  in  our  hearts  from  this  Capitol  and  the  scenes 
of  his  struggles  and  wonderful  triumphs,  let  the  nation  stand 
with  uncovered  head  and  its  bells  peal  forth  the  solemn  sound 
of  an  anthem  more  appropriate  than  any  words  of  mine : 

Toll!  Toll!  Toll! 

All  mortal  life  must  end. 
Toll!  Toll!  Toll! 

Weep  for  the  nation's  friend. 
Oh  !  the  land  he  loved  will  miss  him, 

Miss  him  in  its  hour  of  need ; 
Mourns  the  nation  for  the  nation, 

Till  its  tear-drops  inward  bleed. 
Let  bands  of  mourning  drape  the  homestead, 

And  the  sacred  house  of  prayer ; 
Let  mourning  folds  lay  black  and  heavy 

On  true  bosoms  everywhere ! 
Toll!  Toll!  Toll! 

Xever  again — no  more — 
Comes  back  to  earth  the  life  that  goes 

Hence  to  the  Eden  shore  ! 
Let  him  rest!  it  is  not  often 

That  his  soul  hath  known  repose. 
Let  him  rest! — they  rest  but  seldom 

Whose  successes  challenge  foes. 
He  was  weary,  worn  with  watching, 

His  life-crown  of  power  hath  pressed 
Oft  on  temples  sadly  aching — 

He  was  weary :  let  him  rest ! 
Toll,  bells  at  the  Capitol, 

Bells  of  the  laud,  toll ! 
Sob  out  your  grief  with  brazen  lungs, 

Toll!  Toll!  Toll! 

Mr.  Speaker,  though  death  come  never  so  often,  he  casts  at 
the  portals  of  the  tomb  shadows  ever  new  and  mysterious,  and 
ever  and  always  hath  for  the  living  his  admonitions  and  his 
lessons. 

By  the  side  of  the  grave  we  all  realize  that  there  are  voices 
whispering  to  us  out  of  the  shadowy  silence  beyond  the  river. 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        39 


In  such  an  hour  we  see  with  the  natural  eye  "  as  through  a 
glass,  darkly,"  but  we  have  the  promise  that  if  faithful  we 
shall  see  "  face  to  face."  As  there  is  no  race  of  men  without 
the  idea  of  a  God  and  a  future  life,  so  in  the  presence  of  death 
it  is  natural  for  all  to  pause  and  think  of  the  life  beyond. 

What  is  to  be  the  destiny  of  our  friend  in  "  that  undis 
covered  country  from  whose  bourne  no  traveller  returns,"  it  is 
wisely  not  given  us  to  know.  Let  us  hope  that  he  has  gone 
up  into  the  presence  of  the  God  of  nations  and  of  men  bearing 
in  his  hands  some  of  the  broken  fetters  which  have  fallen  from 
the  limbs  of  oar  4,000,000  emancipated  bondsmen.  These 
shall  testify  of  his  fidelity  to  justice  and  to  his  love  of  the 
human  race. 

In  that  great  day  when  the  secrets  of  all  hearts  shall  be 
revealed,  I  trust  it  may  be  said  to  him  by  the  Father  of  all, 
u  Inasmuch  as  ye  have  done  it  unto  one  of  the  least  of  these 
my  brethren,  ye  have  done  it  unto  me."  And  that  it  will  be 
said  I  may  without  presumption  hope,  for  whatever  may  be 
the  theories  of  men,  whatever  our  hope  for  ourselves  or  for 
others  in  the  life  which  never  dies,  let  us  trust  that  better  than 
all  our  faiths,  and  more  comprehensive  than  our  grandest  con 
ceptions,  an  all- wise  Creator  has  ordained  a  plan  as  broad  as 
the  universe,  and  as  just  as  it  is  infinite,  which  will  compensate 
in  the  future  life  every  soul  which  has  struggled  and  suffered 
for  mankind  in  this. 

Mr.  Speaker,  there  are  moments  in  the  experiences  of  all 
when  we  cannot  convey  to  other  hearts  the  emotions  of  our 
own.  To  me  such  a  moment  is  the  present.  So  many  remi 
niscences  are  crowding  upon  me,  and  so  many  wonderful 
scenes  in  which  our  departed  friend  was  an  actor  are  passing 
as  a  panorama  before  me,  that  I  feel  how  short  I  should  come 
of  doing  them  or  him  justice  were  I  to  dwell  upon  them.  Ko 
man  who  loves  his  country  and  passed  through  those  scenes 


40  REMARKS    OF    MR.    ASHLEY    ON    THE 


in  these  halls  can  ever  forget  them.  When*  I  first  entered 
this  House,  ten  years  ago,  Mr.  Stevens  was  one  of  the  first  to 
take  me  by  the  hand  and  welcome  me.  From  that  day  until 
the  day  of  his  death  he  was  my  friend,  and  often  my 
adviser  and  counsellor.  However  often  I  may  have  differed 
Avith  him — as  I  often  did — there  Avas  one  question  about 
which  we  never  differed :  the  question  of  the  necessity  of  the 
immediate  and  unconditional  abolition  of  slavery.  Of  the 
practicability  and  justice  of  destroying  slavery  he  never 
doubted.  I  am  thankful  that  lie  A\Tas  spared  to  AATitness  the 
end  of  that  indescribable  villainy.  I  rejoice  to  knoAAr  that  as 
the  gates  of  the  Eternal  World  opened  up  before  him  he  was 
permitted  to  look  back  upon  the  land  he  loved  and  nowhere 
behold  the  footprints  of  a  single  slaATe.  Because  of  his  umva- 
vering  fidelity  to  the  poor  bondsmen,  who,  in  the  presence  of 
a  nation  of  oppressors,  were  manacled  and  powerless  and 
dumb,  I  came  to  venerate  him;  and  because  I  venerated  him 
I  come  to-day  to  cast  a  garland  upon  his  tomb.  In  this  self 
ish  Avorld  there  is  nothing  which  so  strongly  enlists  my  sym 
pathies  and  so  much  commands  my  admiration  as  a  heroic 
and  unselfish  life  spent  in  the  interests  of  mankind.  To  me 
it  is  the  most  touching  and  beautiful  of  all  human  struggles. 

In  espousing  the  cause  of  the  slaA7e,  more  than  forty  years 
ago,  Mr.  Stevens  voluntarily  accepted  social  and  political 
ostracism,  and  patiently  endured  the  persecutions  of  ignorant 
and  maddened  men,  for  whose  highest  good  he  was  laboring. 
He  did  this  Avithout  fee  or  hope  of  political  reward,  simply 
because  he  believed  it  to  be  right  ;  and  because  he  Avas  right 
we  shall  some  day  see  the  children  of  the  men  who  stoned 
him  gladly  join  hands  with  the  liberated  slaAre  in  bearing- 
back  the  stones,  in  the  shape  of  blocks  of  whitest  marble, 
with  which  to  build  his  monument. 

I  do  not  assume  to  Avrite  his  epitaph.,     In  a  speech  deliv- 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        41 


ered  in  this  House  January  13,  1865,  he  said,   (I  read  from 
volume  54  of  the  Globe,  page  26G :) 

I  will  be  satisfied  if  ray  epitaph  shall  be  written  thus:  "  Here  lies  one 
who  never  rose  to  any  eminence,  and  who  only  courted  the  low  ambition 
to  have  it  said  that  he  had  striven  to  ameliorate  the  condition  of  the  poor, 
the  lowly,  the  downtrodden  of  every  race  and  language  and  color." 

The  grand  blows  which  he  struck  in  his  great  battle  for 
liberty  and  justice  will  long  survive  him  and  leave  their 
impress  upon  all  lands,  strengthening  the  purpose  of  the  toil 
ing  and  struggling  millions  of  earth.  His  successful  life- 
battle  should  teach  us  the  value  and  self-sustaining  power  of 
a  life  consecrated  to  the  best  interests  of  his  country  and  his 
fellow-men. 

In  this  impressive  hour,  while  reviewing  his  heroic  and 
unselfish  acts,  let  us  renew  our  vows  of  fidelity  to  the  great 
principles  which  he  so  long,  so  ably,  and  so  faithfully  main 
tained.  Let  us  here,  and  now,  pledge  our  lives  anew  to  the 
cause  of  human  liberty  and  human  progress,  resolving  that 
no  obstacle  nor  selfish  interest  shall  cause  us  to  falter,  so  that 
when  we  descend  to  the  tomb  the  benedictions  of  mankind 
shall  bless  us,  as  they  now  bless  him  for  whom  we  mourn, 
and  it  shall  be  said  of  us  as  it  is  IIOAV  said  of  him  : 

He  hath  not  lived  in  vain. 

After  a  long  and  stormy  battle,  with  a  record  which  the 
friends  of  freedom  will  ever  cherish,  full  of  years  and  crowned 
with  honors,  he — 

"  Has  gone  from  this  strange  world  of  ours, 
No  more  to  gather  its  thorns  with  its  flowers ; 
No  more  to  linger  where  sunbeams  must  fade ; 

Where,  on  all  beauty,  death's  fingers  are  laid<r          J_j  J_  J_>  Jtt»   £* 
Weary  with  mingling  life's  bitter  and  sweet ; 
Weary  with  parting  and  never  to  meet. 
Weary  with  sowing  and  never  to  reap ; 
Weary  with  labor  and  welcoming  sleep. 

In  Christ  may  he  rest,"  from  sorrow  and  sin  \j A. jLjJL 

Happy,  where  earth's  conflicts  enter  not  in. 


42  REMARKS    OF    MR.    MILLER    ON    THE 


Remarks  by  Mr.  Miller. 

Mr.  SPEAKER:  During  the  recess  of  Congress  my  venerable 
colleague,  Hon.  Thaddeus  Stevens,  of  the  ninth  district,  passed 
from  the  turmoils  of  life  to  the  peace  and  quiet  of  the  tomb. 
He  was  participating  with  us  in  legislation  when  we  adjourned 
on  the  27th  of  July  last,  and  although  he  was  enfeebled  in 
bodily  health,  I  joined  with  many  others  in  an  earnest  hope 
that  he  would  be  spared  to  meet  with  us  when  we  again 
assembled  here  for  the  transaction  of  business.  The  realiza 
tion  of  that  hope  has  not  been  vouchsafed  to  us.  On  the  12th 
of  August  last,  at  one  o'clock  a.  m.,  at  his  temporary  residence 
within  a  short  distance  from  the  Capitol,  he  died. 

Thaddeus  Stevens  was  born  on  the  4th  of  April,  1792,  in  the 
town  of  Danville,  Caledonia  county,  Vermont.  The  pecuniary 
circumstances  of  his  parents  being  limited,  they  were  unable 
to  furnish  means  for  his  education.  Animated  with  a  purpose 
to  succeed,  through  his  own  perseverance  and  energy  he  was 
successful  in  acquiring  a  liberal  education.  Upon  the  com 
pletion  of  his  collegiate  course  he  bid  adieu  to  his  native  State 
and  home,  and  in  the  year  1814,  at  the  age  of  22,  reached  the 
borough  of  York,  Pennsylvania.  Teaching  school  for  a  live 
lihood,  and  studying  law  in  the  spare  hours  that  intervened, 
he  gradually  prepared  himself  for  the  stern  intellectual  con 
flicts  of  his  after  life.  He  was  admitted  to  the  bar  in  Adams 
county,  and  soon  rose  to  the  head  of  his  profession. 

His  oratorical  powers,  general  information,  and  keenness 

;  of  wit  gained  for  him  a  State-wide  celebrity.  As  an  advocate 
he  was  quick  and  powerful.  Lay  ing  hold  of  the  strong  points 

|  in  a  cause,  he  presented  them  in  a  succinct  and  comprehensive 
manner.  A  large  and  lucrative  professional  practice  flowed  in 
upon  him,  and  almost  at  the  outset  he  displayed  that  charity 
and  generosity  of  his  nature  which  distinguished  his  entire 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        43 


life.  He  was  always  an  ardent  friend  of  public  improvement 
and  universal  education,  a  bitter  opponent  to  human  slavery 
and  oppression.  In  1833  lie  became  a  candidate  for  the  State 
legislature,  and  was  elected  and  re-elected  almost  without 
opposition  up  to  1836,  when  he  was  chosen  a  member  of  the 
convention  to  revise  the  constitution  of  the  State.  During 
his  services  in  the  legislature  and  constitutional  convention 
the  attention  of  the  country  was  attracted  to  his  peculiar  opin 
ions,  capacities,  and  character.  With  a  cultured  mind,  formi 
dable  in  debate  and  fearless  in  expression,  he  immediately 
became  a  leader  and  foremost  in  every  movement  that  con 
templated  the  improvement  of  the  people  and  of  his  adopted 
State.  In  the  convention  for  the  amendment  of  the  State 
constitution  he  was  a  violent  opponent  to  the  insertion  of  the 
word  u  white7'  as  a  qualification  of  voters,  and  opened  upon  its 
advocates  all  the  invective  of  his  ardent  nature.  But  the 
crowning  glory  of  his  life  is  the  noble  disinterestedness,  the 
manly  courage,  and  the  indomitable  will  displayed  and  exer 
cised  in  the  advocacy  of  the  common-school  system  of  Penn 
sylvania.  To  his  tireless  efforts  are  the  people  of  his  adopted 
State  indebted  for  the  incalculable  blessing  of  free  schools. 
Seconded  in  his  efforts  by  the  generous  assistance  of  Governor 
George  Wolf,  he  succeeded  in  having  the  school  law  passed, 
and  when  ignorance  and  prejudice  sought  and  urged  its  repeal 
he  again  stood  up  in  its  defence.  In  a  speech  which  abashed 
his  opponents,  and  which  the  young  of  to-day  still  read  with 
enthusiasm,  he  portrayed  in  a  glowing  light  the  grandeur  of 
the  system,  and  the  importance  of  mental  culture  in  order  to 
sustain  a  republican  form  of  government.  To-day  its  benefits 
are  seen  and  acknowledged.  To-day  the  ostentatious  rich  and 
the  humble  poor  drink  at  its  fountain.  To-day,  standing  by 
the  tomb  of  its  originator,  thousands  pay  tribute  to  his  memory 
and  worth. 


44  REMARKS    OF    MR.    MILLER    ON    THE 


Mr.  Stevens  was  prominent  in  the  administration  of  Gov 
ernor  Eitner,  and  by  Mm  appointed  canal  commissioner.  He 
subsequently  realized  that  his  undivided  attention  to  politics 
had  caused  him  to  neglect  his  private  affairs,  and  especially 
his  large  furnace  in  Adams  county.  He  found  himself  involved 
in  debts,  said  to  exceed  $200,000,  caused  mainly  by  his  partner 
in  the  iron  business.  His  ardent  desire  was  to  liquidate  that 
indebtedness.  The  practice  of  the  law  at  the  Gettysburg  bar 
offered  little  prospect  for  paying  so  large  a  sum,  consequently 
he  concluded  to  remove  to  a  more  extensive  field,  and  finally 
selected  Lancaster  as  his  future  abode.  His  extensive  legal 
acquirements  and  superior  abilities  secured  for  him  a  large 
and  lucrative  practice  at  his  new  home,  which  in  a  few  years 
enabled  him  to  liquidate  his  entire  indebtedness.  Standing 
at  the  head  of  his  profession,  his  many  generous  traits,  polit 
ical  tact,  and  superiority  won  the  confidence  and  respect  of 
his  fellow-citizens.  In  1848  lie  was  nominated  and  elected  to 
the  31st  Congress,  and  in  1850  was  re-elected  to  the  32d  Con 
gress.  At  the  expiration  of  his  second  term  he  again  devoted 
his  attention  to  the  pursuits  of  his  profession.  He  was  after 
ward  elected  to  the  37th,  38th,  39th,  and  40th  Congresses. 
Being  a  member  of  Congress  during  the  most  critical  period 
of  the  nation's  life,  he  displayed  superior  statesmanship  and 
unflinching  patriotism.  Through  all  this  stormy  period  his 
voice  rang  clear  and  loud,  amid  the  pa3ans  of  victory  and  the 
glooms  of  national  disaster,  for  the  triumph  of  liberty  and  the 
permanency  of  the  republic. 

Believing  in  the  justness  of  our  cause,  fully  impressed  with 
the  importance  of  our  success,  he  advanced  with  a  majestic 
tread  toward  the  realization  of  his  hopes.  He  lived  to  see 
the  federal  authority  vindicated,  rebellion  crushed,  and  the 
constitutional  eradication  of  that  barbaric  institution  against 
which  for  more  than  half  a  century  he  Avaged  his  grand  but 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        45 

merciless  crusade.  Then,  the  nation's  power  vindicated,  its 
life  rescued,  its  people  freed,  and  its  honor  maintained,  stand 
ing  in  the  midst  of  his  intellectual  and  political  triumphs, 
with  his  fame  national,  and  his  name  immortal,  death  inter 
vened  and  drew  the  curtain  over  the  drama  of  his  long  and 
eminently  useful  life.  We  shall  never  forget  the  meteoric 
displays  of  his  ponderous  logic,  his  burning  rhetoric,  his  with 
ering  sarcasm.  They  are  a  part  of  the  history  and  glory  of 
the  American  Congress.  Sleeping  in  his  honored  grave  in 
his  adopted  State,  resting  from  earthly  care  and  toils,  the  mel 
ody  of  his  grand  life  still  is  sounding  and  rolling  like  the 
"  heavings  of  the  sea."  His  name,  interwoven  and  com 
mingled  with  the  philosophy  of  our  most  momentous  history, 
will  flow  without  interruption  down  the  lapse  of  ages,  the 
accompaniment  of  the  great  drama  of  human  progress.  His 
example,  so  potent  and  talismanic  in  the  furtherance  of  phi 
lanthropy,  will  grow  brighter  and  brighter  as  time  advances 
and  bravery  is  honored.  He  passed  away  with  the  calm 
composure  of  an  old  hero  of  romance  "  who  had  come  into  the 
world  with  the  birthright  of  liberty  for  the  peoples."  He 
died  nobly,  as  he  had  nobly  lived,  leaving  his  example  as  a 
guiding-star  to  the  world. 

"  Fleet  foot  on  the  correi. 

Sage  counsel  in  cumber, 
Red  Land  in  the  foray, 

How  sound  is  thy  slumber! 
Like  the  dew  on  the  mountain, 

Like  the  foam  on  the  river, 
Like  the  bubble  on  the  fountain, 

Thou  art  gone,  and  forever!" 


46  REMARKS    OF    MR.    ORTH    ON    THE 


Remarks  by  Mr.  Ortli. 

Mr.  SPEAKER  :  The  grave  lias  closed  over  the  earthly-  re 
mains  of  one  of  freedom's  most  ardent  and  eloquent  advocates. 
The  voice  once  so  familiar  in  these  halls  is  hushed  in  death  ; 
its  sound  no  longer  greets  our  ears,  but  its  bold  and  fervid 
enunciations  will  never  be  forgotten. 

That  heroic  devotion  to  truth  and  justice,  to  equality  and 
fraternity,  we  so  often  admired,  and  which  is  exemplified  by 
countless  acts  and  incidents  extending  through  years  and 
years  of  an  active  existence,  is  a  most  worthy  example  for  all 
good  men. 

The  principles  which  he  professed  and  the  work  which  he 
performed,  professions  and  practice  being  in  perfect  harmony, 
will  in  all  future  time  and  in  all  nations  render  the  name  of 
Stevens  a  synonym  for  human  liberty. 

Living  in  an  age  when  opportunities  for  the  accomplish 
ment  of  great  deeds  abounded,  he  seized  upon  and  improved 
these  opportunities.  His  mind  grasped  the  true  philosophy 
of  events,  and  his  practical  common  sense  molded  them  into 
forms  of  enduring  usefulness.  Living  not  unto  himself,  his 
life  has  not  been  in  vain,  and  the  impress  of  his  genius  upon 
the  age  in  which  lie  lived  will  be  as  permanent  as  his  fame. 

The  early  history  of  Thaddeus  Stevens  is  similar  to  that  of 
many  of  our  ablest  and  most  prominent  public  men.  His  par 
ents  were  in  indigent  circumstances,  and  hence  in  his  youth 
he  was  thrown  upon  his  own  resources,  and  taught  those 
lessons  of  self-reliance  which  proved  so  valuable  to  him 
and  to  his  country.  He  was  born  in  the  State  of  Vermont  in 
1792,  and  spent  the  days  of  his  youth  and  early  manhood 
among  her  people,  wrhose  thrift,  energy,  and  frugality,  long 
since  proverbial,  made  a  lasting  impression  upon  his  nature. 
He  entered  the  academy  of  Peacharn,  and,  by  teaching  during 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        47 

the  vacations  of  school,  he  procured  the  means  by  which  he 
was  enabled  to  prepare  himself  to  enter  upon  a  collegiate 
course  of  studies  at  Dartmouth  College,  where,  in  due  time,  he 
graduated  with  distinction. 

He  often  referred,  with  evident  gratification,  to  his  aca 
demic  days  at  Peacham,  and  evinced  his  attachment  for  the  old 
academy  by  frequent  donations  of  books  to  its  library,  as  also 
by  a  valuable  bequest  in  his  last  will  and  testament.  Leaving 
his  New  England  home,  he  selected  Pennsylvania  as  his 
future  place  of  residence,  locating  temporarily  in  the  town  of 
York,  where  he  engaged  in  teaching  school  while  prosecuting 
his  legal  studies.  He  was  admitted  to  the  bar  in  1817,  and  im 
mediately  located  in  Gettysburg,  where  he  continued  to  prac 
tice  his  profession  with  assiduity  and  marked  success  for  the 
ensuing  twenty-five  years.  His  studious  habits,  his  classic 
education,  his  attention  to  business,  and  his  eloquence  and 
ability  soon  placed  him  and  kept  him  at  the  head  of  his  pro 
fession,  at  a  time,  too,  when  he  was  brought  into  frequent  con 
tact  with  some  of  the  best  legal  talent  of  the  State.  His  bear 
ing  in  the  presence  of  the  court  and  bar  was  always  dignified 
and  courteous;  his  cases  were  thoroughly  digested  and  under 
stood,  and  while  he  guarded  carefully  their  weak  points  he 
readily  perceived  and  took  advantage  of  those  of  his  adversary. 
In  the  examination  of  witnesses  he  was  most  successful,  his 
pleasing  and  insinuating  address  gaming  the  confidence  of 
the  witness  and  eliciting  a  truthful  recital  of  the  facts,  while 
his  intimate  knowledge  of  human  nature  enabled  him  at  a 
glance  to  detect  prevarication  or  dissimulation;  and  when 
detected  he  made  the  witness  writhe  under  his  unmerciful 
cross-examination. 

He  was  invincible  in  the  presentation  of  his  facts,  the  appli 
cation  of  the  law  to  the  testimony,  and  in  the  influence  of  his 
eloquence  over  the  hearts  and  minds  of  the  jurors. 


48  RP:MARKS  OF  MR.  ORTH  ON  THE 

Milton,  one  of  his  favorite  authors,  says  : 

True  eloquence  I  find  to  be  none  but  serious  and  hearty  love  of  truth. 

This  love  of  truth  was  one  of  the  strongest  elements  in 
the  character  of  Mr.  Stevens,  and  enabled  him  so  successfully 
to  carry  conviction  to  his  hearers.  He  never  practiced  the 
arts  of  dissimulation,  not  merely  because  he  was  ignorant  of 
their  uses,  but  for  the  reason  that  his  very  nature,  whose  im 
pulses  he  folloAved,  led  him  to  deal  with  perfect  frankness  and 
candor  on  every  occasion. 

He  was  equally  candid  with  friend  and  foe,  and  nothing 
could  induce  him  to  betray  the  one  or  clandestinely  injure  the 
other.  This  virtue  he  practiced  in  the  privacy  of  social  life, 
at  the  bar,  in  his  struggles  on  the  political  rostrum,  and  in  the 
discharge  of  his  severer  and  more  exalted  duties  in  the  halls 
of  legislation,  and  this,  more  than  anything  else,  formed  and 
increased  the  attachment  of  his  friends  and  challenged  the 
respect  of  his  enemies.  Did  I  say  his  enemies  ?  Justice  to 
his  memory  requires  that  I  should  rather  use  the  words  "  politi 
cal  adversaries,"  for  it  is  conceded  by  all  who  knew  him  that 
no  man  ever  passed  through  such  fierce  and  embittered  con 
tests,  running  through  an  active  period  of  half  a  century,  with 
so  few  personal  enemies  during  his  stay  on  earth,  and  no  ani 
mosities  extending  beyond  the  grave.  His  love  of  truth  made 
him  an  earnest  man,  acting  upon  the  principle  that  whatever 
was  worth  doing  at  all  was  worth  doing  well.  He  never 
espoused  a  cause  until  he  was  satisfied  of  its  merits  and  justice, 
and  then  brought  to  its  advocacy  all  the  strength  and  vigor 
of  a  richly  cultivated  intellect. 

The  cause  of  education  always  received  his  hearty  support. 
To  elevate  mankind,  to  improve  their  moral,  intellectual,  and 
physical  condition;  in  a  word,  to  leave  the  world  better  than 
he  found  it,  was  with  him  a  duty  which  he  never  neglected. 

At  the  time  of  his  first  election  to  the  legislature  of  Penn- 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        49 


sylvania,  that  State  had  taken  no  steps  toward  the  organiza 
tion  of  a  system  of  general  education.  The  education  of  her 
children  had  been  left  to  private  or  individual  enterprise,  or  to 
the  voluntary  eifort  of  the  people  in  each  particular  neighbor 
hood.  The  utter  inefficiency  of  these  spasmodic  and  limited 
efforts  to  educate  the  yonth  of  the  State,  or  to  diffuse  intelli 
gence  among  the  people,  was  apparent  to  all  reflecting  persons, 
but  it  belonged  to  Stevens  not  only  to  make  the  inefficiency 
glaringly  manifest,  but  to  propose  and  carry  into  effect  a 
proper  remedy  for  the  evil.  He  believed  with  Aristotle : 

That  the  education  of  youth  ought  to  form  the  principal  part  of  the  legisla 
tors'  attention  cannot  be  a  doubt,  since  education  first  molds  and  afterwards 
sustains  the  various  modes  of  government.  The  better  and  more  perfect  the 
systems  of  education  the  better  and  more  perfect  the  plan  of  government  it  is 
intended  to  introduce  and  uphold.  ,  In  this  important  object  fellow-citizens  are 
all  equally  and  deeply  concerned  ;  and  as  they  aie  all  united  in  one  common 
work  for  one  common  purpose,  their  education  ought  to  be  regulated  by  the 
general  consent,  and  not  abandoned  to  the  blind  decision  of  chance  or  to  idle 
caprice. 

The  innovator  upon  immemorial  usage  is  never  a  welcome 
visitor.  He  meets  with  obstacles  at  the  threshold  of  his  opera 
tions,  and  difficulties  and  impediments  beset  him  at  every  step 
in  his  progress. 

That  education  should  be  universal;  that  the  indigent  orphan 
should  have  the  same  opportunity  for  the  acquisition  of  know 
ledge  with  the  son  of  his  wealthy  neighbor ;  that  the  man  ot 
affluence  should  be  taxed  to  educate  the  child  of  penury,  were 
ideas  at  that  time  not  only  novel,  but  repugnant  to  the  views 
of  a  large  majority  of  the  people  of  Pennsylvania,  and  hence 
the  attempt  to  embody  them  in  the  form  of  legislative  enact 
ment  met  with  stern  and  general  opposition. 

Mr.  Stevens  was  not  the  man  to  be  swerved  from  his  pur 
poses  by  adverse  opinions;  he  met  argument  with  argument, 
conquered  prejudice  by  the  presentation  of  truth,  and  crushed 
the  demagogue  with  his  withering  and  irresistible  sarcasm, 
4 


50  REMARKS    OF    MR.    ORTH    ON    THE 


Amid  difficulties  which  might  have  appalled  more  timid  men, 
he  entered  upon  the  advocacy  of  the  principle  that  all  children 
are  the  wards  of  the  commonwealth,  and  that  it  is  alike  the 
interest  and  the  duty  of  the  commonwealth  to  provide  for  their 
education. 

The  habits  and  opinions  of  a  century  do  not  readily  yield  to 
the  demands  of  advancing  ideas,  and  for  years  this  question 
of  universal  education  was  the  subject  of  animated  and  fre 
quently  of  acrimonious  discussion.  It  entered  into  the  politi 
cal  contests  of  the  day,  and  to  such  an  extent  w^as  the  oppo. 
sition  manifested  that  the  motto  " No  free  schools"  was  em 
blazoned  on  many  banners,  and  became  the  shibboleth  of  par 
tisan  warfare.  The  contest  was  of  long  duration;  but  in  all 
contests  with  error  truth  will  eventually  triumph,  and  his 
adopted  State  now  justly  exults  in  having,  through  his  instru 
mentality,  one  of  the  best  systems  of  popular  education  in 
the  Union. 

Many  of  his  best  friends  at  the  time  feared  the  effect  of  his 
bold  advocacy  of  so  unpopular  a  measure  on  his  future  politi 
cal  prospects ;  but  this  was  a  consideration  which  never  entered 
his  mind,  and  his  course  on  this  question,  like  all  the  great 
acts  of  his  life,  exhibited  the  unselfishness  of  his  nature. 

In  addressing  his  constituents  at  Gettysburg,  while  this 
question  was  agitating  the  people,  he  said : 

I  shall  feel  myself  abundantly  rewarded  for  all  my  efforts  in  behalf  of  uni 
versal  education  if  a  single  child  educated  by  the  commonwealth  shall  drop  a 
tear  of  gratitude  on  my  grave, 

During  his  residence  at  Gettysburg  an  academy  or  gymna 
sium  was  organized  by  a  few  of  the  prominent  citizens,  and 
Stevens  soon  conceived  the  idea  of  building  on  this  modest 
foundation  an  institution  of  more  enlarged  pretension  and  of 
much  wider  usefulness.  Through  his  influence  as  a  member 
of  the  legislature  a  charter  was  obtained  changing  the  gym- 


/    •* 

LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        a  L    <r  f 

*  -4 
'  ^^ 

nasium  to  "The  Pennsylvania  College  f  and  what  was  then 
remarkable,  he  also  secured  a  donation  from  the  State  of  an 
amount  of  money  sufficient  to  erect  for  the  college  its  prin 
cipal  and  most  costly  edifice.  The  consideration  for  this 
munificent  grant  was  the  gratuitous  education  by  the  col 
lege  of  a  specified  number  of  indigent  young  men  who  might 
from  time  to  time  avail  themselves  of  this  privilege,  and 
the  further  condition  that  the  German  language  should  con 
stantly  be  taught  in  the  institution,  which  conditions  have 
at  all  times  been  most  faithfully  performed.  He  was  promi 
nently  and  actively  connected  with  the  material  and  educa 
tional  interests  of  the  college,  as  a  member  of  the  board  of 
trustees,  from  its  organization  to  the  time  of  his  death. 

The  trustees  have  recently  erected  an  additional  edifice  to 
be  used  in  connection  with  the  college,  which,  in  honor  of  his 
friendship  for  the  institution  and  the  interest  he  manifested 
in  its  success,  has  most  appropriately  been  named  "Stevens's 
Hall." 

He  was  a  zealous  advocate  of  free  speech,  concurring  fully 
in  the  sentiment  of  Jefferson,  that  "error of  opinion  can  safety 
be  tolerated  so  long  as  reason  is  left  free  to  combat  it." 

To  him  the  idea  was  most  preposterous  that  there  should  be 
aay  subject  so  sacred  as  to  forbid  examination  or  debate. 
Whatever  seeks  to  avoid  scrutiny  or  shrinks  from  investiga 
tion  is  justly  subject  to  suspicion,  and  that  which  cannot  bear 
the  test  of  thorough  discussion  is  in  its  nature  inimical  to  re 
publican  institutions. 

I  remember  an  incident,  which  occurred  during  my  school 
boy  days  at  Gettysburg,  at  once  illustrating  his  devotion  to 
the  cause  of  free  speech  and  his  influence  over  the  minds  of 
those  with  whom  he  was  brought  in  contact. 

In  1837  the  anti-slavery  question  began  to  be  agitated  in 
various  parts  of  the  country,  and  Professor  Blanchard,  of 


52  REMARKS    OF    MR.    ORTH    ON    THE 


Cincinnati,  one  of  the  earliest  advocates  of  emancipation, 
visited  Gettysburg  for  the  purpose  of  delivering  a  series  of 
anti- slavery  lectures.  The  very  announcement  of  his  purpose 
created  an  intense  excitement  in  the  community,  for  Gettys 
burg  is  situated  within  a  few  miles  of  the  old  Mason  and 
Dixon's  line,  and  an  abolition  lecturer  would  have  been  just 
as  welcome  in  Maryland  as  in  the  border  counties  of  Penn 
sylvania. 

The  professor  called  his  meeting  and  challenged  discussion. 
The  challenge  was  accepted  by  two  of  the  most  prominent 
citizens  of  the  borough  5  but  at  the  close  of  the  debate  resolu 
tions  were  passed  deprecating  any  further  agitation  on  the 
subject,  and  plainly  intimating  to  the  professor  that  his  pres 
ence  was  no  longer  desirable  in  that  community — a  hint  which 
in  those  days  was  very  generally  understood. 

Mr.  Stevens  had  been  absent  on  professional  business ;  but 
on  his  return,  learning  what  had  been  done,  another  meeting 
was  called,  and  the  court-house  was  soon  filled  with  an  angry 
.and  excited  audience.  He  requested  some  friend  to  move  a 
reconsideration  of  the  resolutions,  and  then  proceeded  to  ad 
dress  the  meeting.  Those  who  heard  his  effort  on  that  occa- 
.sion  will  never  forget  it.  His  manner  was  calm,  deliberate, 
impressive,  and  the  excited  crowd  listened  with  earnest  atten 
tion.  To  listen  was  to  be  convinced.  Warming  gradually 
with  his  subject,  he  enforced  the  right  of  free  discussion  on 
all  subjects  with  a  power  and  an  eloquence  which  his  audi 
ence  had  never  heard.  The  sacred  rights  of  American  citi 
zenship,  secured  by  constitutional  guarantees,  were  defended 
by  a  master  hand.  In  turn  he  used  persuasion,  entreaty,  ar 
gument,  wit,  and  sarcasm,  until  finally,  turning  to  his  old 
neighbors  and  friends,  he  appealed  to  their  sense  of  honor  and 
justice,  to  their  individual  reputation  and  the  reputation  of 
their  community,  as  deeply  involved  in  their  contemplated 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        53 

proceedings  ;  and  when  he  took  his  seat  the  resolutions,  which 
had  been  previously  adopted  without  a  dissenting  voice,  found 
no  one  bold  enough  to  advocate  their  passage.  On  the  con 
trary,  a  new  set  of  resolutions  were  introduced  and  passed 
with  singular  unanimity,  affirming  the  right  of  free  discus 
sion,  and  inviting  this  early  anti-slavery  missionary  to  con 
tinue  his  labors. 

The  triumph  was  complete,  not  only  for  Mr.  Stevens,  but, 
what  was  infinitely  more  gratifying  to  him,  it  was  a  triumph 
of  reason  over  prejudice;  and,  I  need  hardly  add,  it  was  the 
last  attempt  to  apply  the  "  slaveholder's  gag"  in  that  portion 
of  our  country. 

He  was  the  firm  friend  of  the  oppressed  and  the  implacable 
enemy  of  the  oppressor.  Like  the  great  Wesley  before  him, 
he  regarded  the  institution  of  American  slavery  as  "the  sum 
of  all  villanies,"  and  suffered  no  occasion  to  pass  unimproved 
when  in  his  power  to  expose  its  monstrosity  or  destroy  its 
vitality. 

He  was  ever  ready  "to  proclaim  liberty  throughout  the  land 
and  unto  all  the  inhabitants  thereof ;w  and  when  the  institu 
tion  began  to  crumble  and  fall,  amid  the  crackling  flames  of 
that  rebellion  which  it  had  instigated,  he  felt  like  exclaiming, 
with  one  of  old : 

Lord,  now  lettestthouthy  servant  depart  in  peace,  according  to  thy  word,  for 
mine  eyes  have  seen  thy  salvation. 

While  practicing  his  profession  at  Gettysburg,  the  cases  of 
fugitive  slaves  were  quite  numerous,  and  where  arrests  were 
made  which  came  to  his  knowledge,  he  invariably  volunteered 
his  services  to  defend  the  alleged  fugitive ;  and  it  is  among 
the  reminiscences  of  the  neighborhood  that  he  seldom  if  ever 
failed  to  secure  the  freedom  of  his  clients. 

On  one  occasion,  while  journeying  to  Baltimore  for  the  pur 
pose  of  replenishing  his  law  library,  he  stopped  for  the  night 


54  REMARKS    OF    MR.    ORTH    ON    THE 

at  a  hotel  in  Maryland,  kept  by  a  man  with  whom  he  was  well 
acquainted.  Soon  after  his  arrival  he  discovered  quite  a  coin- 
motion  among  the  servants  at  the  hotel,  and  a  woman  in  tears 
approached  him  and  implored  his  assistance  to  prevent  the 
contemplated  sale  of  her  husband,  who  was  a  slave.  On  in 
quiring  who  and  where  her  husband  was,  she  replied,  "  Why, 
Massa  Stevens,  he  is  the  boy  who  took  your  horse  to  the  sta 
ble."  Stevens  knew  the  "  boy,"  and  at  once  went  to  his  owner 
and  expostulated  with  him  in  reference  to  his  sale,  and  at 
length  offered  to  pay  him  $150,  half  the  price,  if  he  would 
restore  him  to  liberty.  The  landlord  was  inexorable,  and  Ste 
vens,  knowing  the  relations  between  the  slave  and  his  master, 

replied,  "Mr. ,  are  you  not  ashamed  to  sell  your  own  flesh 

and  blood?"  This  stinging  appeal  only  brought  forth  the 
response,  "  I  must  have  money,  and  John  is  cheap  at  $300." 

Prompted  by  his  generous  nature  Stevens  purchased  and 
manumitted  "  John,"  and  then  retraced  his  steps  to  Gettys 
burg,  without  completing  his  journey  to  Baltimore.  At  that 
time  $300  was  a  large  sum  of  money  for  one  who  had  been 
but  a  few  years  at  the  bar,  and  he  postponed  the  replenish 
ing  of  his  law  library  to  a  more  convenient  season. 

The  word  charity  in  its  broadest  sense  fails  to  express  the 
boundless  benevolence  of  his  heart.  He  was  never  so  happy 
as  on  those  occasions  when  he  could  assist  the  suffering, 
relieve  the  distressed,  and  comfort  the  needy. 

No  one  ever  applied  to  him  for  assistance  and  was  refused. 
While  struggling  with  poverty  himself  he  gave  the  widow's 
mite,  and  when  afterward  success  attended  him  his  bounties 
were  increased  in  corresponding  ratios.  He  was  not  only  "  a 
cheerful  giver,"  but  in  these  matters  he  was  not  willing  that 
the  right  hand  should  know  what  the  left  hand  had  done.  He 
preferred  that  his  charities  should  descend  quietly  as  the 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        55 


dews  of  heaven,  and,  like  the  summer  breeze,  be  felt  but  not 
seen. 

Like  Cornelius,  he  "gave  much  alms  to  the  people;"  in 
fact,  he  was  the  almoner  of  Gettysburg  during  his  long  resi 
dence  there,  with  this  wide  difference,  that  he  made  distribu 
tion  only  of  his  own  means,  and  never  limited  his  benefac 
tions  to  the  tenth  of  his  income. 

When  lurking  treason,  which  had  been  nursed  for  years  in 
our  country  by  men  high  in  favor  with  the  people  and  high  in 
official  station,  culminated  in  civil  war,  Stevens  was  a  most 
prominent  and  influential  member  of  this  House.  His  whole 
life  had  witnessed  his  devotion  to  the  country,  to  those  funda 
mental  principles  proclaimed  in  the  Declaration  of  Independ 
ence,  and  his  faith  in  their  ultimate  incorporation  into  the 
national  Constitution. 

The  first  hostile  gun  of  the  rebellion  convinced  him  that 
the  accursed  institution  of  slavery  would  be  overthrown,  that 
the  Union  would  survive  the  shock  of  battles,  and  that  the 
conflict  would  evolve  a  purer  republicanism  and  an  advanced 
spirit  of  humanity. 

His  efforts  in  and  out  of  Congress  were  devoted  to  a  vigor 
ous  prosecution  of  the  Avar,  to  devising  ways  and  means  for 
such  prosecution,  and  to  keep  the  public  mind  firmly  fixed 
upon  the  true  nature  of  the  assault  upon  the  Union,  and  its 
defence,  and  thus  to  have  it  prepared  to  accept  those  truths 
which  he  foresaw  would  inevitably  result  from  a  victory  for 
the  Union. 

The  patient,  self-sacrificing  endurance  of  our  people  and 
the  valor  of  our  soldiers  at  length  crushed  the  rebellion,  and 
re-established,  so  far  as  military  power  could  re-establish,  the 
authority  of  the  national  government.  With  the  cessation  of 
hostilities  came  questions  of  civil  polity,  as  important  as  they 
were  novel,  requiring  solution  and  permanent  adjustment. 


56  REMARKS    OF    MR.    ORTH    ON    THE 


The  public  mind  was  unsettled;  conflicting  opinions  most 
naturally  forced  themselves  to  the  surface,  while  political 
theories,  formed  on  the  narrow  basis  of  old  passions  and  pre- 
j unices,  claimed  public  attention.  Here  was  a  field  for  the 
statesman,  and  Stevens  entered  it  with  that  self-reliance 
with  which  a  consciousness  of  his  own  power  and  the  strength 
of  his  political  convictions  invested  him.  Others  doubted 
and  hesitated,  but  to  him  the  future  was  as  unclouded  and  as 
certain  as  the  past.  He  was  no  revolutionist,  but,  penetrat 
ing  through  the  gloom  of  battles  and  the  uncertainties  which 
troubled  most  minds,  he  perceived  the  end  from  the  begin 
ning,  and  when  the  end  came  he  was  prepared  to  meet  its 
demands  and  its  responsibilities. 

The  apparently  popular  heresy  that  the  States  in  rebellion 
had  not  by  that  act  changed  their  "  proper  practical  rela 
tions"  to  the  Union,  and  hence  were  at  once  restored  to  their 
former  position,  was  soon  dissipated  by  the  sturdy  blows  it 
received  under  his  leadership. 

With  the  abandonment  of  this  theory  the  true  policy  to  be 
pursued  toward  the  States  and  people  lately  in  rebellion  was 
easily  ascertained,  and  the  emphatic  endorsement  of  that 
policy  by  the  voice  of  the  nation,  together  with  the  gradual 
accomplishment  of  its  purposes,  have  demonstrated  alike  its 
wisdom  and  its  justice. 

He  is  gone.  He  has  finished  his  course  on  earth,  but  the 
great  work  to  which  he  devoted  so  many  hours  of  patient 
thought  and  honest  toil  is  not  yet  finished.  The  high  aim  of 
his  life,  that  to  which  he  brought  all  the  energies  of  his  nature, 
which  enlisted  the  warm  sympathies  of  his  noble  soul  and  en 
gaged  the  powers  of  his  vigorous  intellect,  was  to  have  his 
country  free  and  all  her  people  equal,  to  have  a  land 

"Where  manhood  reigns  alone, 
And  every  citizen  is  king." 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.         57 

Freedom  lias  been  obtained,  but  freedom  has  not  yet  been 
secured,  and  will  not  be  secured  until  all  our  people  shall  have 
the  full  enjoyment  of  perfect  equality  by  the  law  and  before 
the  law.  Freedom  without  secured  equality  of  rights  is  a  de_ 
lusion  and  a  snare ;  and  although  his  countrymen  have  in  his 
memory  and  in  his  deeds  a  rich  legacy  which  they  will  always 
cherish  with  pride  and  with  honor,  yet  with  this  legacy  is 
coupled  a  responsibility,  and  that  is  to  proceed  with  the  work 
in  which  he  was  so  zealously  engaged,  to  complete  the  struc 
ture  in  the  spirit  of  its  master  workman.  So  complete  it  that 
from  foundation-stone  to  turret,  in  all  its  parts  and  designs, 
there  shall  be  no  fault  and  no  blemish  ;  that  the  eye  of  the 
critic  can  discover  no  defects,  and  the  heart  of  the  patriot 
desire  no  change.  So  complete  it  that  when  finished  it  will 
meet  with  the  approbation  of  all  good  men  and  the  approval 
of  a  just  God. 

He  is  gone.  That  frail  tenement  of  clay  so  lately  moving 
among  us  is  mingling  with  its  kindred  dust,  but  the  name  and 
fame  of  Thaddeus  Stevens  will  never  die. 

In  all  the  coming  years  of  time,  so  long  as  patriotism  has  a 
votary  and  freedom  an  advocate,  his  name  will  be  lisped  and 
his  fame  will  be  cherished  by  the  countless  millions  of  the 
future,  and  while  his  countrymen  linger  around  his  consecrated 
grave  their  aspirations  will  ascend  to  Heaven  that  a  kind 
Providence  who  rules  over  the  destinies  of  nations  may  grant 
to  our  beloved  country  many  more  such  men. 


Remarks  by  Mr.  Koontz. 

Mr.  SPEAKER  :  The  ordinary  business  of  the  day  is  suspended, 
that  the  House  of  Representatives  may  pay  its  tribute  of 
respect  to  the  memory  of  its  departed  leader.  Since  the  last 
session  of  this  Congress  Hon.  Thaddeus  Stevens,  representa- 


58        REMARKS  OF  MR.  KOONTZ  ON  THE 


tive  from  the  ninth  congressional  district  of  Pennsylvania, 
ripe  in  years  and  in  wisdom,  and  honored  with  the  confidence 
and  love  of  his  fellow-countrymen,  has  passed  from  time  into 
eternity.  No  word  in  commendation  of  his  distinguished  ser 
vices  to  the  country  or  in  praise  of  his  great  talents  is  needed 
in  this  presence,  where  he  was  so  well  known ;  nor  are  the  eulo 
gies  that  are  pronounced  here  on  this  occasion  necessary  to 
convey  to  the  nation  a  correct  idea  of  the  characteristics  of 
the  deceased.  A  prominent  actor  in  the  mighty  events  which 
have  transpired  within  the  last  eight  years,  he  stands  out  in 
marked  distinctness  before  a  people  Avho  have  watched  with 
intense  pleasure  his  devotion  to  country,  with  unbounded  ad 
miration  the  exhibition  of  his  commanding  talents,  and  who 
have  on  frequent  occasions  been  swayed  by  his  resistless,  burn 
ing  eloquence. 

But  if  the  tear  of  sorrow  is  shed  for  and  the  word  of  tribute 
spoken  of  the  less  distinguished  of  earth  who  have  passed 
from  the  stage  of  life,  with  how  much  more  sorrow  should  we 
mourn  those  who  are  numbered  among  the  nation's  dead! 
When  they  who  have  achieved  distinction  in  war,  statesman 
ship,  oratory,  poetry,  science,  or  philosophy  have  "  shuffled  off 
this  mortal  coil,"  the  rivalries  that  were  begotten  in  the  busy 
arena  of  life  are  remembered  no  longer,  the  peculiarities  of 
character  that  excited  hostility  in  the  breasts  of  others  are 
forgotten,  and  a  generous  people  remember  only  the  ability 
and  virtue  of  the  deceased  and  treasure  them  as  evidence  of 
the  nation's  advancement  in  civilization,  and  as  the  enduring 
monuments  of  her  own  greatness  and  glory.  The  many  years 
of  distinguished  public  service  of  the  deceased,  his  skill  as  a 
parliamentarian,  his  recognized  ability  as  a  leader,  and  the 
powerful  influence  he  wielded  in  the  councils  of  the  nation 
gave  him  such  prominence  in  the  eyes  of  the  American  people 
that  since  his  death  they  remember  him  not  only  as  the  leader 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        59 


of  a  great  party,  but  as  a  great  American  statesman,  whose 
name  will  be  inscribed  on  the  historic  page  along  with  those 
whom  the  nation  delights  to  honor. 

Of  the  prominent  men  of  this  generation  perhaps  none  have 
greater  claims  to  public  gratitude  than  Mr.  Stevens.  In  Penn 
sylvania  his  name  will  ever  be  associated  with  the  beneficent 
system  of  common  schools,  the  establishment  of  which  was 
owing  to  his  ability,  perseverance,  and  energy.  The  humblest 
lad  in  the  rudest  cabin  within  the  limits  of  the  State  will  live 
to  bless  the  memory  of  Thaddeus  Stevens,  for  having  placed 
within  his  reach  the  means  of  an  education.  If,  according  to 
the  distinguished  historian,  Macaulay,  the  gift  of  Athens  to 
mankind  of  intellectual  knowledge  constitutes  her  chief  glory, 
and  will  perpetuate  her  memory,  even  in  the  decay  of  her  lan 
guage  and  the  degeneracy  of  her  people,  to  the  remotest  pos 
terity,  amid  the  rise  and  fall  of  kingdoms  and  empires,  may  it 
not  truthfully  be  said  that  the  people  of  Pennsylvania  owe  a 
debt  of  gratitude  to  Mr.  Stevens  for  this  great  gift  to  her  sons, 
which  will  exist  as  long  as  her  mountains  stand,  and  that  his 
memory  will  be  preserved  by  them  while  their  language 
remains  to  speak  his  praises  I 

But,  passing  beyond  the  confines  of  his  adopted  State,  we 
find  that  his  name  is  widely  known  throughout  the  country, 
and  that  by  his  jmblic  course  he  has  earned  a  nation's  grati 
tude.  A  gigantic  civil  war  threatened  the  life  of  the  nation 
and  its  public  men  were  put  to  the  severest  test.  Mr.  Stevens 
at  once  rose  into  marked  prominence  by  his  determined  and 
powerful  hostility  to  the  rebellion,  its  aiders  and  abettors  5  and 
his  opposition,  after  its  overthroAAr,  to  all  measures  looking  to 
the  political  ascendency  in  the  government  of  those  lately  in 
arms  to  destroy  it,  made  him  the  idol  of  the  loyal  millions  of 
the  country.  Other  men  might  be  misled  either  by  a  mistaken 
notion  of  what  was  due  to  traitors,  or  a  false  philanthropy,  or 


60        REMARKS  OF  MR.  KOONTZ  ON  THE 


wicked  ambition,  or  desire  for  party  predominance,  but  there 
was  an  abiding-  faitli  in  the  loyal  people  of  the  country  that  in 
Thaddeiis  Stevens  there  Avas  "  no  variableness  or  shadow  of 
turning,"  and  that  in  all  the  mutations  of  time  and  tergiversa 
tions  of  men,  he  would  be  true  to  the  cause  for  which  their 
sons  and  brothers  had  fallen.  His  career  to  its  close  vindi 
cated  fully  the  popular  confidence  in  his  fidelity  to  principle. 

In  foreign  governments  the  noble  men  who  are  inaugurating 
movements  looking  to  the  disenthralment  of  the  masses  from 
kingly  and  aristocratic  rule,  lament  his  death,  and  in  this  hour 
of  sadness  and  sorrow  we  have  their  deepest  sympathy.  There 
is  always  a  strong  tie  between  men  of  enlarged  minds  and  com 
prehensive  intellects,  although  there  may  be  wide  differences 
of  opinion  between  them  as  to  the  best  mode  of  advancing  the 
interests  of  society  and  the  promotion  of  the  welfare  and  hap- 
.piness  of  mankind;  but  how  much  stronger  the  tie  that  binds 
the  men  who  are  moving  together  in  the  great  cause  of  hu 
manity!  The  champions  of  liberal  principles  in  every  cliine 
realize  that  one  of  their  noble  band  is  no  more,  and  not  only  a 
State  and  nation,  but  oppressed  humanity  everywhere,  deplore 
the  death  of  the  great  advocate  of  human  rights. 

But  his  memory  will  be  fondly  cherished  by  that  large  body 
of  people  so  recently  liberated  from  human  slavery.  An  early 
opponent  of  that  institution,  he  battled  against  it  with  all  the 
power  of  his  gigantic  intellect,  until  the  last  shackle  of  the  last 
slave  was  broken,  and  this  day  he  is  revered  by  them  next 
only  to  the  immortal  Lincoln.  His  name  is  a  household  word 
in  the  humble  cabins  of  four  million  people  whom  he  has  helped 
up  from  the  degrading  condition  of  bondage  into  the  blessed 
light  of  freedom,  and  will  be  inseparably  linked  with  that  great 
act  of  national  justice  by  which  the  emancipation  of  a  race 
from  servitude  was  achieved. 

As  a  private  citizen  he  was  kind  and  generous,  and  always 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        61 


ready  to  lend  a  helping  hand  to  the  needy  and  distressed.  In 
public  life  he  was  remarkably  candid  and  unreserved  in  ex 
pression  of  opinion.  There  was  as  little  danger  of  mistaking 
his  views  on  any  subject  of  public  interest  as  that  his  antago 
nists  would  not  feel  the  strength  of  his  powerful  intellect  in 
enforcing  them.  He  has  been  aptly  styled  the  great  0 ommoner 
of  the  United  States.  In  many  respects  he  was  like  the  great 
Commoner  of  England.  Like  him  he  was  bold  and  fearless 
in  the  advocacy  of  the  measures  he  espoused.  Like  the  elder 
Pitt  he  was  not  sordid.  His  worst  enemy  could  not  say  of 
him  that  he  enriched  himself  at  the  expense  of  the  public. 
Like  him  he  carried  his  measures  often  by  his  terrible  ear 
nestness,  often  by  his  withering  sarcasm  and  fiery  invective. 
Like  him  he  rose  into  great  and  commanding  influence  in  the 
nation,  and  successfully  carried  out  the  measure  he  had  so 
dauntlessly  advocated. 

But,  sir,  time  does  not  permit  me  to  extend  these  remarks. 
A  great  man  has  fallen.  This  hall  will  no  longer  resound  with 
his  eloquence  or  the  nation  be  thrilled  with  his  patriotic  ut 
terances,  but  in  the  ages  to  come  the  heart  of  the  patriot  and 
lover  of  humanity  Avill  swell  with  joy  and  gratitude  at  the 
mention  of  the  name  of  Thaddeus  Stevens. 


Remarks  %  Mr.  Donnelly. 

MR.  SPEAKER  :  As  a  representative  of  one  of  the  new 
Commonwealths  of  the  great  West,  I  would  add  a  few  words 
to  the  tributes  which  have  already  been  paid  to  the  memory 
of  Mr.  Stevens.  The  West  owed  him  much.  Although  born 
among  the  mountains  of  Vermont,  and  representing  here  an 
inland  district  of  Pennsylvania,  his  heart  was  as  broad  and 
liberal  as  his  brain,  and  embraced  in  its  great  scope  every 
portion  of  the  continent.  His  sympathies  were  especially 


62       REMARKS  OF  MR.  DONNELLY  ON  THE 

active  in  behalf  of  those  new  communities  whose  destiny 
has  been  to  subdue  the  wilderness  and  spread  in  constantly 
widening  circles  the  domain  of  society  and  civilization.  It 
is  especially  fitting,  therefore,  that  the  West  should  add  to 
the  wreaths  which  already  adorn  his  bier. 

In  every  aspect  in  which   we  consider  him  Mr.  Stevens 
was  a  great  man. 

No  one  who  ever  knew  him  could  doubt  the  prodigious  force 
and  vigor  of  his  intellect.  It  seemed  to  embrace  all  the  diver 
sified  subjects  of  legislation  incident  to  a  great  country  and 
a  high  degree  of  civilization.  While  there  might  be  here  and 
there  a  member  who,  upon  some  special  topic,  surpassed  him, 
there  was  no  man  in  Congress  who  was  so  thoroughly  convers 
ant  with  such  a  multitude  of  subjects.  A  singularly  retentive 
memory  held  ever  ready  for  use  the  experience  and  the  learn 
ing  acquired  during  a  long  and  industrious  life.  The  move 
ments  of  his  mind  were  as  original  and  peculiar  as  they  were 
rapid  and  accurate.  His  power  in  debate  was  unequalled. 
His  replies  were  such  as  could  not  be  anticipated.  He  flashed 
back  upon  his  opponent  from  some  new  stand-point,  or  with 
some  quaint  conceit  that  astonished  while  it  confused  him. 
His  irony  was  terrible ;  it  was  withering;  it  denuded  sophistry 
to  the  bones.  It  left  no  room  for  reply.  The  adroitness  ac 
quired  during  long  practice  at  the  bar  was  everywhere  mani 
fested  in  his  conduct  of  debate.  He  knew  when  to  strike  and 
when  to  loosen  his  hold,  and  when  to  yield  the  non-essentials 
to  save  the  essentials,  but  he  never  forsook  his  purpose. 

An  intellect  of  this  nature,  accompanied  by  a  degree  of 
physical  vigor  which  carried  the  vivacity  of  youth  and  the 
endurance  of  manhood  far  into  the  domain  of  old  age,  would 
have  made  Mr.  Stevens  a  marked  man  in  any  position  in 
life  and  in  any  age  of  the  world.  But  behind  this  intellect 
there  was  a  character  still  more  remarkable.  Behind  this 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        63 

brain-power  there  lay  a  will-power  which  has  rarely  been 
equalled  among  the  sons  of  men ;  an  intensity  of  purpose  which 
no  obstacle  could  arrest,  no  defeat  daunt,  and  a  determination 
of  character  which  brightened  with  every  encounter  and  rose 
freshened  from  every  overthrow.  Nothing  could  stand  in  the 
path  of  his  purpose.  That  grim  face  never  turned  aside  to 
catch  the  fickle  murmurs  of  popular  applause.  Public  opinion 
had  no  terrors  for  him.  It  should  be  written  over  his  tomb 
that  "he  never  played  the  demagogue."  He  never  stepped 
down  upon  the  lower  plane  of  popular  error,  but  at  all  times 
and  on  all  occasions  he  dared  to  do  right,  looking  Heaven  in 
the  face  and  fearing  no  man.  He  never  flattered  the  people ; 
he  never  attempted  to  deceive  them;  he  never  "paltered  with 
them  in  a  double  sense ;"  he  never  courted  and  encouraged  their 
errors.  On  the  contrary,  on  all  occasions  he  attacked  their 
sins,  he  assailed  their  prejudices,  he  outraged  all  their  bigot 
ries;  and  when  they  turned  upon  him  and  attacked  him  he 
marched  straight  forward,  like  Gulliver  wading  through  the 
fleets  of  the  Lilliputians,  dragging  his  enemies  after  him  into 
the  great  harbor  of  truth. 

But  all  his  intellect  and  character  were  secondary  to  the 
principles  which  underlaid  them.  These  were,  indeed,  great 
and  noble. 

Nature  had  given  Mr.  Stevens  a  generous  heart.  He  was 
emphatically  the  friend  of  man.  He  seemed  to  feel  that  every 
wrong  inflicted  upon  the  human  race  was  a  blow  struck  at 
himself.  He  could  not  understand  that  a  wrong  could  have 
any  rights.  He  denied  the  power  of  time  to  sanctify  injustice. 
The  dust  of  antiquity  could  not  screen  from  his  indignant 
glance  the  horrible  proportions  of  cruelty.  He  seemed  to  feel 
that  there  should  be  no  peace  in  this  world  until  every  wrong- 
was  righted,  and  he  believed  that  the  true  end  of  government 
was  to  right  all  the  wrongs  men  suffer.  He  was  the  embodied 


64       REMARKS  OF  MR.  DONNELLY  ON  THE 


spirit  of  revolution.  In  the  great  French  struggle  his  oratory 
would  have  outblazed  Mirabeau.  He  would  have  exulted  in  the 
glorious  work  of  tearing  to  shreds  monarchy  and  aristocracy, 
and  lifting  to  their  feet  the  poor,  degraded,  oppressed  peas 
antry  of  France. 

He  would  admit  no  compromise  with  wrong.  It  could  nei 
ther  smile  nor  frown,  nor  coax  nor  bully  him  into  submission. 
Even  the  dark  shadow  of  assassination  could  not  turn  him  a 
hair-breadth  from  his  path.  He  brought  the  spirit  of  John 
Brown  into  the  work  of  the  statesman.  He  led  the  assault 
against  an  embattled  host  of  wrongs  and  errors,  and  under 
the  providence  of  God  they  went  down  before  him  and  left  the 
field  clear  almost  to  the  horizon.  All  honor  in  the  day  of  peace 
to  the  gallant  leader  whose  ringing  voice  never  faltered  amid 
all  the  surging  uncertainties  of  the  terrible  struggle. 

Against  slavery  as  the  mighty  embodiment  of  all  human 
wrongs  Mr.  Stevens  threw  the  force  of  his  intellect  and  char 
acter  from  the  very  first.  He  felt  with  Mr.  Lincoln  that  "  if 
slavery  was  not  wrong  nothing  was  wrong."  Its  presence 
under  the  American  flag  he  regarded  as  an  outrage  ;  it  polluted 
the  very  air;  it  cried  out  with  a  million  tongues  to  heaven; 
no  fact,  no  incident  connected  with  it,  but  was  a  perpetual 
appeal  to  the  human  heart.  Mr.  Stevens  was  from  the  first 
an  uncompromising  abolitionist — not  yesterday  alone,  but 
thirty,  forty,  fifty  years  ago,  when  slavery  was  a  sacred  thing, 
and  its  opponents  were  ranked  among  the  criminals  of  the 
land. 

Such  sentiments  for  a  long  time  excluded  him  from  public 
life.  At  length  came  the  great  revolution.  The  blind  wrong 
had  dragged  down  upon  itself  the  pillars  of  the  temple.  The 
curtain  rose  upon  the  grandest  drama  of  the  world;  and  the 
grim,  iron-willed  old  man  stepped  forward  to  do  his  appointed 
work.  His  was  the  most  striking  figure  of  all  the  illustrious 


~^>K  £K^! 

LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.  /  ^65 


group  gathered  in  that  great  scene.  He  had  no  doubts^-4lo 
scruples ;  he  did  not  weep  over  his  opportunities  ;  he  exulted  <- 
in  them.  He  seized  axe  and  brand  and  set  himself  to  work  to 
burn  and  hew  out  the  giant  wrong  of  American  society,  and 
the  rigid  lips  never  relaxed  while  he  thought  a  single  root  or 
branch  retained  vitality.  It  was  his  privilege  to  live  until  the 
work  of  legislation  was  completed  and  the  institutions  of  the 
country  placed  on  the  broad  basis  which  his  heart  and  judg 
ment  approved.  His  dying  ears  heard  only  the  growlings  of 
the  turbid  and  bloody  waves  of  rebellion  as  they  settled  and 
subsided  into  peace  forever. 

Mr.  Stevens  regarded  his  labors  in  behalf  of  popular  edu 
cation  as  the  crowning  glory  of  his  life.  He  was  right.  Here 
his  enlarged  philanthropy  and  his  far-reaching  statesmanship 
had  fullest  scope.  The  school-houses  of  Pennsylvania  are  his 
noblest  monument.  Innumerable  generations  yet  unborn  will, 
in  that  illustrious  Commonwealth,  preserve  his  name  in  per 
petual  remembrance  as  their  first  and  greatest  benefactor. 

A  life  so  complete  does  not  ask  our  tears.  Here  is  room  only 
for  pride  and  admiration,  and  gratitude  to  God  that  in  the 
hour  of  our  deadly  need  he  raised  up  such  a  man  to  lead  our 
national  councils,  and  to  infuse  into  a  wavering  nation  his  own 
indomitable  spirit  and  his  own  magnificent  love  of  right  and 
horror  of  injustice.  He  passes  into  history,  and  the,  love  of  a 
great  people  gathers  around  and  accompanies  and  hallows 
him.  It  can  be  justly  said  of  him  "  he  was  the  friend  of  man." 
The  world  holds  no  prouder  eulogy. 


Remarks  by  Mr.  Cake. 

Mr.  SPEAKER  :  The  public  man  who  works  for  fame  rarely 
achieves  it.   If  he  does,  he  soon  finds  it  a  perishing  uncertainty. 
After  all,  posterity  is  an  inexorable  judge,  and  no  matter  how 
5 


66  REMARKS    OF    MR.    CAKE    ON    THE 

the  paid  eulogist  or  the  partial  historian  exaggerates  what  is 
good  or  palliates  what  is  bad,  time's  ultimate  verdict  is  always 
discriminating  and  just. 

Thaddeus  Stevens  was  a  fine  illustration  of  this  theory.  No 
statesman  in  any  age  so  often  took  issue  with  what  is  called 
public  opinion,  but  what  might  be  better  styled  public  preju 
dice.  Emigrating  to  Pennsylvania  more  than  a  half  a  century 
ago  from  New  England,  that  normal  school  of  the  continent, 
and  settling  down  among  the  retrogressive  German  population 
on  the  borders  of  a  slave  State,  and  sharing  much  of  the  intol 
erance  of  slavery,  the  very  first  thing  he  did  was  to  take  up 
arms  for  education  and  freedom.  These  were  the  pole  stars  of 
all  his  politics,  and  in  following  them  he  encountered  more 
obstacles  than  ever  beset  the  path  way  of  a  public  man.  There 
is  something  sublime  in  his  struggle  with  these  obstacles. 
Undismayed  he  pursued  the  bitter  path;  undaunted  he  met 
the  organized  foe.  No  expediency,  no  compromise,  110  party 
turned  him  aside  from  his  grand  objective  point.  His  efforts 
I  for  universal  education  were  crowned  with  victory  earlier  than 
,  his  efforts  against  slavery. 

But  he  was,  if  possible,  more  intense  in  his  hostility  to 
slavery  than  in  his  championship  of  education.  Here  he  was 
the  foremost  teacher  of  the  middle  States.  With  a  heroism 
that  outlived  censure  and  defied  majorities,  he  maintained  the 
unequal  fight  through  more  than  a  generation.  Caring  nothing 
for  himself  and  nothing  for  party,  if  he  could  not  mold  the  latter 
according  to  his  principles,  he  aroused  the  most  violent  enmi 
ties  and  dared  the  most  formidable  combinations.  If  freedom 
won  he  was  content;  to  secure  that  he  was  always  ready  to 
sacrifice  everything  else. 

And  now,  Mr.  Speaker,  as  we  look  back  over  the  past  eight 
years,  is  there  one  Eepublican  who  will  not  admit  that  if  we 
had  followed  his  lead  from  the  first,  much  of  the  resulting 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        67 


treachery,  bloodshed,  and  death  would  have  been  avoided"? 
We  have  reached  the  remedy  at  last ;  and  what  is  that  which 
gives  us  safety,  which  secures  the  rights  of  millions  yet  unborn, 
but  that  great  remedy  of  Thaddeus  Stevens :  justice,  equality, 
and  freedom  to  all  men,  irrespective  of  race,  color,  or  nativity? 

Our  great  leader  did  not  Avork  for  fame.  He  did  not  play 
the  courtier ;  he  did  not  deal  in  the  currency  of  compromise  ;, 
he  did  not  natter  the  people ;  he  never  was  a  beggar  for  their 
votes.  And  yet,  behold !  He  is  remembered,  and  honored  in 
his  remembrance,  by  friend  and  foe.  Look  at  this  house  to 
day.  Eecall  the  loud  acclaim  of  sorrow  that  mourned  his 
death  while  it  conceded  his  matchless  attributes,  and  tell  me, 
sir,  if  this  is  not  genuine  fame,  that  fame  resulting  from  a  bold, 
manly,  rugged,  and  unselfish  career,  unsought,  untoiled  for, 
yet  freely  tendered  by  a  proud  and  grateful  country,  without 
distinction  of  party,  sect,  or  creed? 

Sir,  it  is  not  often  that  one  man  can  do  so  much  for  any 
people  as  Thaddeus  Stevens  has  done.  But  for  him  Pennsyl 
vania  would  have  been,  perhaps,  the  last  of  the  old  free  States 
to  establish  an  educational  system  based  upon  equal  taxation. 
But  for  his  example  our  seminaries  of  learning  would  have 
been  inferior  and  few.  Half  a  million  young  men  and  women 
within  our  borders  are  this  day  chiefly  indebted  to  him  for 
the  blessings  of  a  sound  education.  I  freely  acknowledge  my 
own  indebtedness.  When  he  delivered  his  great  speech  in  the 
house  of  representatives  of  Pennsylvania,  in  1835, 1  was  seven 
years  old.  The  institutions  that  sprang  into  existence  under 
the  inspiration  of  that  great  eifort  proved  to  be  my  opportu 
nity,  and  I  shall  never  cease  to  bear  testimony  to  the  value 
of  his  work  on  that  occasion. 

Beared  in  another  political  party,  I  never  failed  to  cherish 
and  honor  his  name ;  and  when  I  entered  the  printing  office 
in  my  thirteenth  year,  found  myself  equipped  for  a  rapid  and 


68  REMARKS    OF    MR.    CAKE    ON    THE 

thorough  understanding  of  the  mysteries  of  that  art  of  all 
arts.  Later  in  life,  when  the  war  dissolved  old  party  preju 
dices,  and  when,  a  democratic  journalist,  I  found  that  as  one 
of  the  advocates  of  Judge  Douglas  for  President  the  honest 
logic  of  my  convictions  placed  me  in  association  with  the 
republican  party,  it  was  a  natural  progress  for  me  to  become 
one  of  the  followers  of  Thaddeus  Stevens,  and  to  oppose 
slavery  as  I  had  opposed  all  the  antagonism  of  the  school  law. 

Coming  into  this  House  at  the  close  of  the  war,  in  which  I 
did  but  my  duty  as  a  soldier  and  citizen,  I  looked  up  to  him 
as  my  leader  and  my  friend.  1  had  never  met  him  till  I  saw 
him  on  this  floor  5  here,  upon  every  occasion  I  found  him 
a  kind,  intelligent,  and  generous  mentor.  Once,  for  reasons 
that  I  deemed  conclusive  to  my  mind,  I  voted  against  an 
appropriation  to  one  of  the  colleges  in  this  District.  It 
was  very  nearly  lost,  when  Mr.  Stevens  asked  me  to  change 
my  vote,  saying  that  he  would  give  me  his  reasons  for  the 
request  after  the  bill  was  disposed  of.  Upon  the  announce 
ment  of  the  result  he  turned  to  me  and  said:  " Young  man, 
let  me  implore  you  in  all  your  after  life  never  to  oppose  any 
measure  for  the  education  of  the  people.  Follow  this  advice 
and  you  will  never  regret  it." 

Mr.  Speaker,  it  is  never  becoming  to  cover  the  dead  with 
unmerited  eulogy,  and  in  speaking  these  honest  words  of 
Thaddeus  Stevens  I  am  not  trying  to  make  him  a  perfect 
character.  Like  all  strong  men,  he  had  his  faults,  and  he 
neither  denied  nor  defended  them ;  but  in  the  sterling  traits 
of  manhood  he  was  a  conspicuous  example.  The  eloquent 
gentlemen  who  have  preceded  me  have  told  you  how  brave  he 
was  in  public  life,  how  true  to  his  convictions,  how  fearless  in 
his  support  of  all  measures  intended  to  elevate  the  people  and 
to  develop  the  resources  of  the  country. 

Not  to-day,  but  in  the  time  to  come,  will  Thaddeus  Stevens 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        69 

be  fully  appreciated.  His  whole  life  was  devoted  to  the 
cause  of  humanity,  and  he  lived  to  see  the  fruition  of  his 
hopes  in  the  most  complete  victory  over  the  enemies  of  educa 
tion  in  Pennsylvania  and  of  freedom  throughout  our  land. 
Congratulating  himself  upon  his  two  great  victories,  he  conld 
peacefully  fold  his  arms  in  the  sleep  that  knows  no  waking 
upon  earth,  secure  in  the  belief  that  he  had  accomplished  a 
great  work,  and  that  those  who  profit  by  his  life  will  revere 
his  memory  forever.  The  men  and  women  who  have  been  and 
are  yet  to  be  educated  in  the  common  schools  of  Pennsylvania, 
and  the  bond  who  have  been  made  free,  to  free  whom  he  gave 
the  labor  of  his  best  days,  are  the  beneficiaries  of  his  noble 
and  self-sacrificing  life. 

That  which  will  stand  to  his  honor  as  long  as  his  record  as 
a  statesman  are  these  proofs  of  his  love  for  his  fellow-men. 
No  great  benevolence  ever  appealed  to  him  in  vain.  No  poor 
man  struggling  with  adversity,  no  young  man  who  sought  his 
aid  in  the  beginning  of  his  career,  no  penitent  rebel,  impov 
erished  Ik-  the  war,  ever  asked  Thaddeus  Stevens  in  vain  for 

\N  ' 

assistance.  What  is  this  but  a  religious  example  ?  How 
much  Mtter,  Mr.  Speaker,  than  the  hollow  profession  which 
contents  itself  with  words,  and  never  ripens  into  glorious 
deeds !  Leigh  Hunt's  beautiful  allegory  has  often  been  applied 
to  others,  but  it  seems  to  have  been  written  for  Thaddeus 
Stevens.  Bear  with  me  as  I  read  it  to  you,  and  tell  me  if  it 
be  not  a  faithful  picture  of  the  great  mind  which,  though  the 
body  it  animated  is  dust,  still  lives  to  guide  and  strengthen 
the  children  of  men: 

Abou  Ben  Adliem  — may  his  tribe  increase — 
Awoke  one  night  from  a  deep  dream  of  peace, 
And  saw,  within  the  moonlight  in  his  room, 
Making  it  rich,  and  like  a  lily  in  bloom, 
An  angel  writing  in  a  book  of  gold. 
Exceeding  peace  had  made  Ben  Adhem  bold, 


70       REMARKS  OF  MR.  WOODWARD  ON  THE 


And  to  the  presence  in  the  room  he  said, 
"What  writest  thou  ?"  The  vision  raised  its  head, 
And  with  a  look  made  of  all  sweet  accord, 
Answered,  "The  names  of  those  who  love  the  Lord." 
"And  is  mine  one  ?"  said  Abou.     "  Nay,  not  so," 
Replied  the  angel.     Abou  spoke  more  low, 
But  cheerly  still,  and  said,  "  I  pray  thee,  then, 
Write  me  as  one  that  loves  his  fellow-inen." 

The  angel  wrote,  and  vanished.     The  next  night 
It  came  again  with  a  great  wakening  light. 
And  show'd  the  names  whom  love  of  God  had  bless'd, 
And,  lo  !  Ben  Adhem's  name  led  all  the  rest. 


Remarks  by  Mr.  Woodward. 

Mr.  SPEAKER:  My  acquaintance  with  Mr.  Stevens  began  in 
1835.  He  was  a  man  of  mark  from  Ms  first  appearance  in  the 
legislature  of  Pennsylvania,  and  he  advanced  at  once  in  that 
body  to  the  front  rank  of  debaters,  though  the  best  talents  of 
the  State  were  then  in  the  legislature. 

I  well  remember  the  passionate  appeals  by  which  he  lashed 
our  staid  old  commonwealth  into  a  frenzy  of  prejudice  against 
the  Masonic  institution  for  its  guilty  agency,  supposed  or 
actual,  in  the  abduction  and  murder  of  Morgan,  riot  long 
before,  in  western  New  York.  Mr.  Stevens  made  himself  the 
great  champion  of  the  anti-Masonic  party,  and  the  leader  of 
those  who  elected  Joseph  Eitner  governor  in  1835.  Having 
accepted  the  office  of  canal  commissioner  from  Governor  Eit 
ner,  and  retaining  his  seat  in  the  legislature  as  the  represen 
tative  of  Adams  county,  he  carried  measures  with  a  high 
hand  for  three  years.  Beyond  all  question  he  became  the 
most  influential  man  in  Pennsylvania.  The  star  of  his  fame 
culminated  to  its  zenith.  Doubtless  his  bold  and  earnest 
nature  hurried  him  into  many  excesses  of  opinion ;  but  it  is 
creditable  to  his  memory  that,  in  that  day  of  his  greatest 
power,  he  was  the  eloquent  advocate  of  a  system  of  common 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.         71 


schools  which,  though  vehemently  opposed  in  its  origin,  has 
grown  into  great  favor  with  the  people  of  Pennsylvania. 
Governor  Eitner,  like  many  of  the  Germans  of  onr  State, 
regarded  the  system  with  distrust,  while  Governor  Wolf,  who 
was  Eitner's  competitor  for  gubernatorial  honors  in  1835, 
favored  its  introduction.  Mr.  Stevens  staked  his  political 
fortunes  on  this  measure.  Alluding  to  the  contest  between 
Wolf  and  Eitner,  and  to  its  possible  turn  upon  the  school 
question,  he  exclaimed,  "  If  this  is  to  be  a  struggle  between 
the  powers  of  light  and  the  powers  of  darkness,  I  go  for  him 
whose  banner  streams  in  light."  His  significant  threat 
brought  the  anti-Masonic  party  into  the  support  of  the  school 
law. 

It  was  during  this  period  that  I  met  Mr.  Stevens  in  a  popu 
lar  convention  held  in  the  court-house  at  Harrisburg,  and 
which  was  called  the  "  Integrity  of  the  Union  convention." 
Alarmed  at  the  tendency  of  the  measures  of  New  England 
abolitionists,  the  people  of  Pennsylvania  sent  delegates  to 
Harrisburg  to  strengthen  the  bands  of  the  Union.  Mr. 
Stevens  ridiculed  the  convention  into  nothingness.  Affecting 
excessive  solicitude  for  the  "integrity  of  the  Union,"  he 
brought  his  matchless  powers  of  invective  and  sarcasm  to 
bear  against  every  measure  that  was  proposed,  and,  with  the 
adoption  of  some  unimportant  resolutions,  the  convention 
vanished. 

I  next  met  him  in  the  Eeform  Convention,  a  body  elected 
in  pursuance  of  law  to  propose  amendments  to  the  constitu 
tion  of  Pennsylvania.  At  first  he  took  a  very  active  part  in 
the  organization  and  debates  of  this  body,  but  gradually  his 
interest  in  its  proceedings  subsided  until  he  withdrew  himself 
almost  wholly  from  its  deliberations.  He  declined  to  sign  the 
new  constitution  because  the  word  "  white"  had  been  intro 
duced  into  the  suffrage  clause  before  the  word  freeman,  thus 


72  REMARKS    OF    MR.    WOODWARD    ON    THE 


limiting  suffrage  to  white  freemen.  On  no  subject  were  his 
opinions  more  firmly  fixed  than  in  favor  of  the  social  and 
political  equality  of  the  African  with  the  Caucasian.  Of  this 
his  course  in  Congress,  which  is  known  and  read  of  all  men, 
has  afforded  abundant  illustration. 

In  the  fall  of  1838  the  great  political  contest  came  on 
between  David  E.  Porter,  the  democratic  candidate  for  gover 
nor  of  Pennsylvania,  and  Governor  Eitner,  who  was  up  for 
re-election  on  the  anti-Masonic  ticket.  Mr.  Stevens  did  his 
utmost  for  Eitner.  He  brought  into  full  play  not  only  all  his 
great  resources  of  eloquence,  wit,  and  sarcasm,  but  as  canal 
commissioner,  having  control  of  considerable  patronage,  he 
inaugurated  a  system  of  colonization  for  political  effect, 
which  politicians  have  improved  upon  and  practiced  more  or 
less  ever  since.  Porter  beat  Eitner  in  1838,  and  then  Mr. 
Stevens  made  the  capital  mistake  of  his  life  in  determining  to 
treat  the  election  as  if  it  had  not  occurred.  This  brought  on 
the  "  buckshot  war."  That  disturbance  made  no  strain  upon 
our  political  institutions.  Indeed,  it  is  doubtful  if  it  excited 
as  much  attention  from  the  people  of  the  other  States  as  its 
importance  demanded,  but  abroad  it  was  looked  upon  as  a 
portentous  event.  The  late  Mr.  Dallas,  our  then  minister  at 
the  court  of  St.  Petersburg,  told  me  he  was  annoyed  by  daily 
notes  from  the  whole  diplomatic  circle  anxiously  inquiring  for 
the  news  from  Harrisburg,  while  his  correspondents  at  home 
treated  the  subject  as  too  insignificant  to  allude  to,  and  there 
fore  he  had  no  information  to  communicate.  But  the  buck 
shot  war,  if  it  wrought  no  great  political  revolution,  took  Mr. 
Stevens  out  of  political  life  for  many  years.  He  removed  to 
the  city  of  Lancaster  and  addressed  himself  with  great  ability 
and  success  to  the  practice  of  his  profession.  It  was  my 
privilege  to  know  much  of  him  as  a  lawyer,  and  it  affords  me 
far  more  pleasure  to  contemplate  his  professional  than  his 
political  career. 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.         73 


As  a  Pennsylvania  lawyer  he  had  learned  to  appreciate  that 
greatest  luminary  of  the  bench,  Hon.  John  B.  Gibson,  and  a 
the  May  term  of  the  supreme  court,  in  1853,  Mr.  Stevens 
announced  the  decease  of  Judge  Gibson  in  brief  and  exquisite 
terms.  His  neat  speech,  together  with  the  more  elaborate 
eulogy  of  Chief  Justice  Black,  is  printed  in  the  seventh  vol 
ume  of  Harris's  State  Eeports,  and  both  productions  will  well 
repay  the  perusal. 

As  a  lawyer  Mr.  Stevens  was  bold,  honorable,  and  candid, 
clear  in  statement,  brief  in  argument,  and  always  deferential 
to  the  bench.  He  was  not  copious  in  his  citation  of  adjudged 
cases.  I  think  he  relied  more  upon  the  reasons,  than  upon  the 
authorities  of  the  law.  Indeed,  his  tastes  inclined  him  rather 
to  the  study  of  polite  literature  than  of  the  black  letter.  He 
loved  Pope's  Essay  on  Man  more  than  Siderfm's  Eeports. 
Yet  he  betrayed  no  defect  of  preparation  at  the  bar.  He 
always  came  with  a  keen  discernment  of  the  strong  points  of 
his  case,  and  he  spoke  to  them  directly,  concisely,  and  Avith 
good  effect.  His  humor  was  irrepressible  and  trenchant ; 
sometimes  it  cut  like  a  Damascus  blade.  He  was  a  lucky 
lawyer  who  would  go  through  an  argument  with  Mr.  Stevens 
without  being  laughed  at  for  something.  Mr.  Stevens's  legal 
sagacity  was  exhibited  here,  in  the  presence  of  all  of  us,  when 
he  suggested  the  eleventh  article  of  impeachment,  which  came 
nearer  costing  the  President  his  official  life  than  all  the  other 
articles  together. 

But,  Mr.  Speaker,  I  have  said  enough  to  indicate  the  high 
regard  in  which  the  deceased  was  held  as  a  lawyer  in  Penn 
sylvania.  Differing  from  him,  toto  ccelo,  in  politics  and  relig 
ion,  I  cannot  think  that  the  final  influence  of  his  great  talents 
upon  the  public  mind  will  be  salutary,  nor  do  I  think  posterity, 
to  whom  the  arbitrament  belongs,  will  rank  him  as  a  benefac 
tor  of  his  race.  But,  nevertheless,  there  was  much  in  him  to 


74  EEMARKS    OF    MR.    ROBINSON    ON    THE 

admire.  His  hguesigLaod  direct ness  o£-purpQse^hisjcourage7 
his  scorn  and  contempt  for  the  low  arts  of  political  tricksters ; 
his  ii'ciKM'osity  to  the  poor,  for  his  hand  and  his  heart  were  as 
open  as  the  day  to  them;  his  learning,  his  eloquence,  his  tem 
perance,  his  industry,  his  firm  will,  his  self-poise — these  were 
the  qualities  that  constituted  his  greatness  and  his  excellence ; 
and  if  his  fame  outlasts  the  age  in  which  he  lived,  it  will  be 
because  it  is  built  on  these  foundations.  "  De  mortuis  nil  nisi 
bonum."  Dr.  Johnson  thought  that  for  "bonum"  we  should 
read  "  verum."  I  approve  the  criticism,  and  I  esteem  it  high 
praise  of  Mr.  Stevens  that  it  can  be  said  of  him  he  so  passed 
through  life  that  his  name  can  endure  the  application  of  the 
maxim  even  in  its  improved  reading. 


Remarks  by  Mr.  Robinson. 

Mr.  SPEAKER  :  Among  the  people  of  Ireland,  whose  legends 
and  poetry  are  frequently  fringed  with  the  silver  foam  of  super 
stition,  there  is  a  venerable  and  ever-to-be-venerated  custom, 
in  the  observance  of  which  on  meeting  a  funeral  you  turn  with 
it,  and  for  a  time,  however  brief,  become  a  part  of  the  solemn 
procession.  It  matters  not  who  treads  the  dark  pathway  to 
the  grave,  whether  death's  footbeats  have  knocked  at  the  cas 
tle  or  the  cabin,  to  the  rich  and  the  poor,  to  the  lowly  and  the 
lordly,  is  paid  this  universal  homage,  by  to-day's  living  and 
to-morrow's  dead. 

Athwart  my  weary  footsteps  over  life's  rugged  highway  this 
funeral  procession  to-day  occurs.  He  who  in  life  provoked 
such  enmities  and  secured  such  friendships  is  now  beyond  the 
reach  of  both,  but  as  this  pageant  passes  I  uncover  my  head 
and  mingle  my  footsteps  in  its  solemnities. 

Of  his  political  opinions,  his  loves  and  hatreds,  his  passions 
and  his  prejudices,  it  is  not  for  me  here  to  speak.  With  many 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        75 


of  them  I  never  could,  nor  is  it  likely  I  ever  shall,  sympathize. 
My  prejudices  against  him  were  as  strong  as  his  against  others, 
and  I  must  confess  that  on  taking  my  seat  here  I  should  not 
have  regretted  had  I  been  able  to  provoke  a  controversy  with 
him,  however  much  the  odds  might  have  been  against  me ;  and 
upon  two  or  three  occasions  when  he  expressed  dissent  from 
my  views  I  did  not  hesitate  to  intimate  that  it  would  not  be 
disagreeable  to  me  to  receive  his  attack  and  break  a  lance  with 
him.  I  had  even  gone  so  far  as  to  look  into  the  public  records 
of  his  adopted  State,  over  which  his  words  and  works  are 
voluminously  written,  to  see  if  I  could  find  a  crevice  in  his 
armor  through  which  I  might  more  successfully  assail  him. 
Had  I  provoked  a  controversy  with  him  my  temerity  might 
have  been  made  manifest  to  all,  and  might  have  betrayed  me 
into  language  which  to-day  and  for  all  time  would  be  a  cause  of 
regret  to  me  and  mine.  On  two  or  three  occasions  when  I 
addressed  this  House  he  came  over  to  this  side  of  the  hall  and 
took  a  seat  in  front  of  mine,  sometimes  interrupting  me  with 
a  playful  or  more  serious  observation,  but  seeming  to  give  a 
pleasant  refusal  to  my  rash  challenge,  and  to  wish  rather  to 
encourage  than  to  woupd. 

Is  it  unbecoming  in  me,  therefore,  now  that  his  ear  is  for 
ever  closed  to  censure  or  to  flattery,  to  say  that  my  search 
for  inconsistency  in  his  public  career  was  in  vain ;  that  he 
above  all  men  seemed  at  least  consistent  in  his  opinions  and 
singularly  bold  in  expressing  and  defending  them  ? 

To  cowards  and  despots  a  hatred  undying, 
For  freedom  a  passion  intense  and  relying, 

A  pride  in  the  resolute  band  ; 
A  hope  that  conld  see  not  a  danger  to  shun 
When  bonds  should  be  broken  and  liberty  won. 

Eadically  as  we  differed  on  measures  in  defence  of  which 
most  of  his  time  recently  was  occupied,  there  were  many  sub 
jects  on  which  we  had  kindred  sympathies.  For  the  oppressed 


76  REMARKS    OF    MR.    ROBINSON    ON    THE 

people  of  Ireland,  for  the  vindication  of  the  rights  of  Ameri 
can  citizens,  for  the  speedier  extension  of  citizenship  and 
suffrage  to  our  immigrant  population,  he  had  strong  and  pro 
nounced  opinions.  And  to  me  it  is  a  source  of  regret  that  his 
voice  will  not  be  heard  nor  will  his  influence  be  felt  in  the 
discussion  and  settlement  of  these  questions;  that  in  the 
great  contest  which  I  fear  is  approaching  on  one  of  them,  his 
clarion  voice  will  not  be  heard  as  it  would  have  been  had  he 
lived,  rallying  his  followers  and  partisans  to  the  defence  of  the 
Declaration  of  Independence,  which  he  contended  guaran 
teed  to  the  governed  the  right  of  choosing  their  governors  by 
universal  manhood  suffrage,  as  well  for  recent  emigrants  from 
despotisms  in  Europe  as  for  immediate  emigrants  from  slavery 
everywhere. 

We  have  all  observed  the  frail  and  yet  tenacious  hold  which 
he  appeared  to  have  on  life.  Nature  had  given  him  many 
difficulties  to  conquer ;  society  had  bestowed  on  him  but  few 
of  its  smiles.  His  life  seemed  to  be  a  life  of  sorrow  suffi 
ciently  marked  to  explain,  if  not  to  excuse,  his  apparent 
bitterness.  'No  kindly  voice  to  whisper  comfort  in  his  sor 
rows  ;  no  hand  to  soften  the  asperities  with  which  this  world's 
conflicts  will  harden  the  downiest  pillow;  no  kindred  heart  in 
whose  sympathetic  throbbings  he  could  read  the  alphabet  of 
love.  He  seemed  like  an  eagle,  perched  alone  upon  a  blasted 
oak  in  sullen  and  defiant  majesty,  scorning  alike  the  chatter 
and  the  scream  of  other  birds  around  him ;  his  eye  sometimes 
seemingly  covered  with  film  as  of  down  from  the  passing  wing 
of  death,  but  in  a  moment  shooting  into  pinions  on  which  he 
proudly  soared  to  the  sun. 

That  proud  and  defiant  spirit,  often  fierce,  sometimes  unfor 
giving,  and  always  bold  and  honest,  has  passed  away.  Is  it 
presumption  to  hope  that  beneath  all  his  outward  apparent 
harshness  there  was  an  undercurrent  of  benevolence ;  that 
the  thunder-cloud  which  hung  upon  his  rugged  brow,  and 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.         77 

from  beneath  which  flashed  the  lightning  of  his  sunken  eye, 
melted  into  the  rainbow  of  hope  and  the  light  of  love,  and 
that  the  closing  scenes  of  his  life,  the  holy  influence,  pure 
prayers,  and  sacred  rites  of  the  pious  sisters,  to  whom  both 
here  and  at  Emniittsburg,  in  Maryland,  he  had  shown  many 
favors,  and  who  repaid  him  tenfold  in  the  deep  devotion  of 
their  unselfish  love,  as  they  wafted  his  departed  spirit  to  the 
gates  of  heaven  on  their  trembling  petition,  and  closed  his 
eyes  in  death ;  with  the  blessing  of  the  venerable  octogenarian 
priest  of  Lancaster,  still  living,  who  loved  and  honored  him 
through  lite,  cleansed  his  soul  from  sin,  and  that  his  spirit 
was  admitted  to  the  mansions  of  the  blest  ? 

But,  Mr.  Speaker,  I  am  apparently  forgetting  that  I  turned 
my  footsteps  only  for  a  moment  with  this  sad  procession,  not 
to  deliver  any  eulogy  or  to  recall  his  frailties.  I  rose  simply 
to  fling  upon  his  passing  bier  a  flower — would  that  it  were 
worthier — a  daisy  or  a  shamrock,  wet  with  the  dew-drop  of  a 
sincere  and  sympathizing  tear ;  and  join  in  the  prayer  which 
thousands  waft  to  Heaven  to-day  that  his  spirit  may  rest  in 
eternal  peace. 


Remarks  by  Mr.  Sypher. 

Mr.  SPEAKER  :  The  character  of  Mr.  Stevens  in  his  relations 
as  a  fellow-townsman  has  been  most  ably  and  appropriately 
commented  on  by  the  gentleman  from  Pennsylvania  who  suc 
ceeds  him  in  this  house.  His  distinguished  services  in  the 
State  of  his  adoption,  both  in  the  cause  of  common  schools 
and  the  construction  of  public  works,  may  with  just  propriety 
be  cited  as  among  the  most  honorable  achievements  of  his  life. 
I  pass  over  the  period  given  to  fostering  and  building  up  the 
institutions  of  the  great  commonwealth  which  he  so  highly 
honored,  and  come  immediately  to  lay  upon  the  grave  of  this 


78  REMARKS    OF    MR.    SYPHER    ON    THE 

great  champion  of  freedom  the  grateful  thanks  of  an  eman 
cipated  race,  of  a  disenthralled  people,  and  of  States  regen 
erated.  It  is  not  unnatural  that  the  loyal  constituency  of 
myself  and  colleagues  on  this  floor  from  the  south  should 
have  regarded  Mr.  Stevens  as  the  foremost  as  well  as  the 
most  earnest  and  trustworthy  defender  of  their  rights.  These 
people  have  ever  been  in  the  peculiar  situation  of  living 
within  the  lines  of  the  enemy,  and,  therefore,  during  all  their 
days  of  hope  and  nights  of  despair,  looking  northward  for 
deliverance,  the  stalwart  form  of  him  who  always  led  the 
advance  guard,  and  who  never  retired  behind  the  picket  line, 
was  ever  most  prominently  in  view. 

Tsjiaddeus  Stevens  was  born  a  leader.  Men,  policies,  and 
parties  were  not  allowed  to  stand  in  his  way.  His  life  was 
devoted  to  the  cause  of  humanity,  and  whatever  race  or  indi 
vidual  wrongfully  oppressed  strove  to  rise  above  the  oppressor, 
found  in  him  a  true  and  faithful  friend  and  able  advocate. 

Thirty  years'  active  participation  in  the  anti-slavery  move 
ment  in  this  country,  and  a  thorough  analysis  of  the  charac 
ter  of  the  slaveholder,  had  fully  prepared  him  to  enter  into  an 
armed  struggle  against  treason  and  traitors.  He  had  no 
sympathy  with  peace  conferences,  compromises,  anct~fesolu- 
tions  of  pacification.  In  the  autumn  of  I860  he  wrote  to  a 
young  man  then  in  Memphis,  Tennessee,  "The  only  way  to 
end  this  rebellion  is  to  conquer  the  rebels."  From  the  first 
hour  when  secession  was  proclaimed  in  South  Carolina  and 
the  property  of  the  nation  was  seized  by  southern  rebels  his 
voice  was  for  war.  In  State  and  in  national  council,  in  his 
place  on  the  floor  of  this  house,  in  private  conferences  with 
the  President  and  the  cabinet,  he  advocated  a  vigorous  pros 
ecution  of  the  war  on  war  principles.  His  propositions  were 
so  bold  that  timid  men  were  startled  and  stood  fixed  in  amaze 
ment.  Before  the  sound  of  the  first  gun  fired  in  the  cause  of 
treason  and  rebellion  had  reached  the  northern  border  of  the 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.         79 


republic,  he  declared  that  freedom  should  be  proclaimed  to 
every  slave  in  the  land,  and  the  loyal  men  of  the  south,  both 
white  and  black,  should  be  invited  to  enroll  themselves  in 
defence  of  the  Union.  He  maintained  that  public  safety 
demanded  nothing  less.  The  brave  old  man  would  have  called 
a  million  of  men  into  service  and  would  have  marched  amid 
the  clash  of  steel  and  the  roar  of  artillery  from  the  Potomac 
to  the  Gulf. 

Thus  he  would  have  swept  treason  before  him,  and  behind 
him,  he  would  have  left  an  unquestionable  guarantee  of  per 
fect  equality  of  rights  before  the  laAV.  In  the  spring  of  1862 
he  declared  upon  this  floor  in  favor  of  immediate  emancipa 
tion.  President  Lincoln  plainly  and  emphatically  expressed 
his  disapprobation  of  this  measure,  and  avowed  that  the 
administration  was  not  in  sympathy  with  that  movement. 
Late  in  the  summer,  after  the  nation  had  been  disciplined  by 
the  failure  of  the  peninsular  campaign,  President  Lincoln 
turned  to  the  speech  in  which  this  great  and  wise  measure 
was  advocated.  He  sent  for  Mr.  Stevens,  apologized  for  the 
opposition  made  to  him,  and  declared  himself  in  favor  of  eman 
cipation.  These  two  great  men  of  the  nation  were  agreed  as  to 
the  fact,  but  differed  as  to  time.  Stevens  favored  immediate 
emancipation;  Lincoln  thought  best  to  give  the  rebels  due 
notice  that  they  would  lose  their  slaves  if  they  did  not  lay 
down  their  arms.  Fortunate,  thrice  fortunate  for  the  nation 
and  especially  for  my  constituents,  the  God  of  nations  hard 
ened  the  hearts  of  the  enemy  and  they  did  not  cease  to  make 
war,  and  therefore,  at  the  expiration  of  one  hundred  days, 
came  the  proclamation  of  freedom  that  Stevens  would  have 
issued  three  hundred  days  before. 

Following  the  emancipation  came  the  struggle  on  the  ques 
tion  of  arming  the  colored  men  of  the  south,  who  had  just 
obtained  the  right  of  self-ownership.  Stevens  again  boldly 
advanced  to  the  picket  line  and  lashed  his  tardy  compeers  up 


80  REMARKS    OF    MR.    SYPHER    ON    THE 

to  the  duty  of  self-preservation.  When  the  last  terrible  blow 
had  crushed  armed  rebellion  the  work  of  the  soldier  ended 
and  that  of  the  statesman  began;  then  the  doctrine  of  univer 
sal  amnesty  was  promulgated  from  the  highest  places  in  the 
nation ;  it  was  preached  from  the  pulpit ;  it  was  recommended 
in  cabinet;  it  was  advocated  in  the  most  powerful  journals  in 
the  land.  In  the  mighty  struggle  that  followed,  wherein  all 
that  had  been  won  by  force  of  arms  was  about  to  be  sacrificed 
by  the  sophistry  of  diplomacy,  Stevens  was  again  the  bul 
wark  of  the  nation,  almost  the  sole  defender  of  the  rights  of 
the  loyal  millions  of  the  southern  States.  But  for  his  services 
in  the  work  of  reconstruction  a  whole  race  of  people,  upon 
whom  the  first  rays  of  the  light  of  freedom  had  just  dawned, 
would  have  been  surrendered  unconditionally  into  the  hands 
of  the  enemy. 

Step  by  step  he  fought  his  way  up,  dragging  the  nation 
after  him,  until  he  attained,  by  the  aid  of  many  able  and 
brave  associates  in  Congress,  the  organization  and  establish 
ment  of  governments  in  the  rebellious  States  upon  the  basis 
of  a  loyal  citizenship  and  perfect  equality  of  rights.  In  this 
final  labor  of  his  life,  when  victory  dawned  upon  the  nation, 
the  heroic  old  man  died  at  his  post,  beckoning  the  people  for 
ward  to  higher  and  nobler  achievements.  Never  will  the 
services  of  this  great  man  be  duly  appreciated  by  those  in  the 
defence  of  whose  rights  he  so  manfully  struggled.  His  name, 
with  that  of  Lincoln,  will  ever  be  remembered  with  the  warm 
est  emotions  of  gratitude  by  this  and  succeeding  generations 
of  the  emancipated  people  of  America,  when  others  now 
esteemed  gre'at  shall  have  been  forgotten.  He  needs  no  statue 
of  bronze,  no  pillar  of  marble  with  carved  inscriptions  to  tell 
posterity  his  fame.  The  labors  and  achievements  of  his  life 
have  rendered  him  immortal.  In  the  name  of  the  loyal  south, 
whose  fertile  fields  have  been  opened  to  free  and  skilled 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        81 

labor;  in  the  name  ot  toiling  millions  seeking  homesteads; 
in  the  name  of  States  now  no  longe'r  cursed  by  slavery;  in  the 
name  of  a  people  struggling  from  abject  slavery  up  to  perfect 
freedom ;  in  the  name  of  a  race  once  declared  to  be  possessed 
of  110  rights  which  white  men  were  bound  to  respect,  but  now 
clothed  with  the  full  rights  of  citizenship,  which  the  whole 
power  of  the  nation  is  pledged  to  defend,  I  thank  God  that 
Thaddeus  Stevens  lived  and  labored  and  triumphed. 


Remarks  by  Mr.  WMttemore. 

Mr.  SPEAKER  :  I  cannot  expect,  nor  do  I  endeavor,  to  excel 
the  words  "so  fitly  spoken"  eulogistic  of  the  life,  character, 
influence,  and  worth  of  "the  great  commoner,"  whose  name 
has  dwelt  so  often  upon  the  lips  of  the  whole  people,  whose 
words  and  works  have  become  a  part  of  the  history  of  our 
national  greatness,  whose  good  and  generous  heart  beat  in 
sympathy  for  all  humanity,  whose  every  effort  was  inspired 
for  the  elevation,  improvement,  and  prosperity  of  the  race; 
but  I  can  express  somewhat  the  grief  which  the  i>eople  of  my 
State,  in  common  with  our  whole  country,  have  felt  in  the  loss 
of  him  who  Avas  the  friend  of  all  men,  who  loved  his  neighbor 
as  himself,  who  was  an  invincible  pioneer  in  all  the  noble 
measures  which  have  become  the  security  of  our  hopes  and 
the  ark  of  safety  of  our  national  unity.  The  emancipated, 
the  enfranchised,  the  reconstructed,  the  restored  States,  the 
millions  redeemed  from  the  house  of  bondage,  once  chattels, 
now  freemen,  with  their  title  deeds  of  citizenship  guaranteed, 
who  owe  so  much  to  his  untiring  efforts  in  their  behalf,  his 
uncompromising  fidelity  to  the  right,  felt  in  his  loss  that  a 
peer  of  Abraham  Lincoln  had  fallen;  and  in  their  memories 
will  ever  live  sacred  associations  clustering  around  the  coun 
sels  he  has  given,  the  hope  and  courage  he  has  inspired,  the 
6 


82  REMARKS    OF    MR.    COVODE    ON    THE 

glorious  fruition  of  Iris  life-long  wish  and  labor.  In  the  homes 
of  the  lowly,  in  the  hearts  of  the  emancipated,  he  has  been 
enshrined. 

When  the  sad  news  of  the  death  of  Thaddeus  Stevens 
reached  niy  State  the  general  assembly  of  South  Carolina 
passed  appropriate  resolutions  and  draped  her  legislative  halls 
in  the  semblances  of  mourning.  Throughout  the  Common 
wealth  expressions  of  sorrow  upon  countenance  and  lip  were 
the  true  exponents  of  the  solemn  bereavement  that  had  been 
visited  upon  the  nation.  South  Carolina,  with  her  sisters,  re 
stored  to  her  place  in  the  councils  of  the  republic  by  his  per 
sistent  endeavor  and  patriotic  labor,  weeps  for  the  mighty 
dead,  thanking  the  Giver  of  all  good  for  the  examples  of  his 
life,  the  sterling  honesty  of  his  nature,  and  unflinching  devo 
tion  to  right,  justice,  and  truth. 

I  saw  him,  when  he  was  yet  among  us  at  the  close  of  the 
session  in  July,  weak  in  body,  yet  powerful  in  mind,  true  to 
the  last  at  his  post.  Upon  informing  him  of  the  results  which 
had  been  accomplished  in  South  Carolina  through  the  policies 
he  had  so  unceasingly  advocated  and  triumphantly  secured, 
he  said  to  me:  "Go  on,  sir;  never  fear  to  do  right."  I  shall 
ever  remember  his,  to  me,  last  words.  His  voice  will  ever  be 
heard  inspiring  me  in  the  future  of  my  life-toil,  my  private  and 
public  responsibilities. 

Let  the  exhortation  of  the  nations,  "Well  done,  good  and 
faithful  servant,"  influence  us  in  all  the  legislation  before  us 
which  he  may  have  left  unfinished,  to  be  true  to  our  God,  our 
country,  ourselves,  and  our  fellow-men. 


Remarks  by  Mr.  Covode. 

I  cannot  hope  to  add  anything  to  the  mournful  interest  of 
this  occasion,  or  to  contribute  to  a  true  appreciation  of  the 
character,  services,  and  merits  of  Mr.  Stevens ;  but  my  inti- 


LIFE  AND  CHARACTER  OF  THADDEUS  STEVENS.        83 

macy  with  him  was  so  close  and  long-continued,  my  admira 
tion  for  him  so  sincere  and  thorough,  and  iny  sorrow  at  his 
death  so  deep,  that  I  feel  constrained  to  offer  a  humble  tribute 
to  his  memory. 

The  beginning  of  his  public  career  antedates  most  of  the 
men  now  active  in  the  politics  of  Pennsylvania,  and  his  career 
was  stormy,  eventful,  and  remarkable,  for  it  covered  more 
than  40  years  of  ceaseless  activity.  Few  men  have  ever 
aroused  so  intense  feeling;  his  friends  were  drawn  to  him  by 
an  irresistible  fascination,  and  were  bound  to  him  by  the  in 
dissoluble  tie  of  admiration  and  love.  His  enemies  were  ever 
repelled  by  the  undaunted,  almost  haughty  manner  in  which 
he  met  their  advances.  By  nature  a  thorough,  logical,  and 
consistent  radical,  he  cordially  spurned  every  species  of  com 
promise,  and  he  utterly  contemned  that  truckling  policy  which 
so  generally  barters  solid  principle  for  temporary  advantage. 
He  despised  every  form  of  time-serving,  and  was  absolutely 
scornful  in  his  contempt  for  tricksters.  His  path  was  ever 
straight  to  the  goal  of  his  ambition  over  every  obstacle  and 
hindrance.  He  never  deviated  in  his  faith  or  his  purpose, 
save  when  a  modification  of  means  might  hasten  and  insure 
the  accomplishment  of  his  purpose.  He  was  loftily  and  hero 
ically  devoted  to  the  ideas  which  possessed  him,  grandly  true 
to  the  great  thoughts  which  filled  and  animated  his  noble  soul. 
He  was  a  sincere  lover  of  mankind,  a  keen  sympathizer  with 
poverty,  an  honest  hater  of  injustice,  a  friend  of  the  down 
trodden,  and  faithful  fighter  for  the  rights  of  all  men  to  free 
dom,  protection,  and  security.  This  was  the  key-note  of  his 
public  career,  and  the  path  he  trod  is  illustrated  all  along  with 
the  proofs  of  his  fidelity  to  those  principles  which  were  early 
implanted  and  which  quickly  ripened  into  animating  motives. 

In  his  private  relations  he  was  eminently  large-hearted. 
He  was  a  truthful  man,  an  honorable  man,  a  thoroughly 


84  REMARKS    OF    MR.    COVODE,    ETC. 

manly  man.  His  charity  was  as  extensive  as  Ms  knowledge 
of  suffering,  and  was  princely  in  its  liberality.  He  was  in  Ids 
personal  relations  kindly,  affectionate,  tender  and  winning. 
No  man  excelled  him  in  the  brilliancy  of  his  conversation, 
none  left  his  presence  unimpressed  by  his  ever  active  sympa 
thies.  The  devotion  to  his  mother  of  this  lion-hearted  man 
was  at  once  a  proof  and  an  illustration  of  his  capacity  for  the 
deepest  and  tenderest  feeling.  Absorbed  most  of  his  life  in 
the  keen  pursuits  of  politics,  some  hardening  of  the  nature 
might  naturally  have  been  expected,  but  only  those  who 
knew  him  in  closest  intimacy  knew  how  his  weary  heart 
yearned  for  loving  objects  to  rest  upon. 

But  he  has  gone.  Whatever  we  may  have  felt  in  life,  we 
all  now  realize  how  large  a  space  he  filled,  how  sagacious 
and  true  he  was,  how  nobly  and  unselfishly  devoted  to  his 
country,  how  sedulously  careful  he  was  to  guard  it  from  pros 
pective  dangers,  and  how  comprehensively  he  realized  what 
measures  were  necessary  to  give  the  country  security  for  the 
future.  Let  us  go  forward  in  the  policy  he  traced,  fortify  the 
buttresses  of  the  nation,  and  let  the  republic,  thoroughly 
reconstructed  upon  the  principles  of  the  Declaration  of  Inde 
pendence,  and  thereby  dedicated  to  immortal  life,  be  worthily 
his  ever-enduring  monument. 

The  resolutions  were  unanimously  adopted  ;  and  thereupon 
(at  4  o'clock  p.  m.)  the  House  adjourned. 


14  DAY  USE 

iTURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 
Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 


/  a 


jtfrhr 


-  • 


liflaroo 


R£C'D 


3  1  1966  7  9 

-  •  --  _  —  _ 

NWH-6612RCO 


LD  21A-50m-ll  '62 
(D3279slO)476B 


General  Library 

University  of  California 

Berkeley 


YB  37473 


